Is Wildfire Decline in Forest a Clue to the Solution?

Experts have identified why fires in a Midwestern forest are declining, providing a look into a potential solution as flames grow along the East Coast.

An Advancing Earth and Space Sciences study published on Monday found that large wildfires are increasing globally. Western U.S. regions have historically struggled with wildfires, with flames ravaging millions of acres yearly. Experts have now identified that wildfires are burning larger and more frequently in the Eastern Temperate Forests found in the southern and eastern United States.

The study found that large wildfires in the eastern U.S. have nearly doubled from 1984-1999 to 2005-2018, with experts warning that "continued warmer and drier conditions are projected to increase wildfire risk."

Despite the dim outlook on wildfires in the U.S., data from one Midwestern forest could give experts a clue on how to solve the burning problem. The study found that a decline in wildfires occurred in the North Central Hardwood forests due to widespread "mesophication," in which fire suppression promotes a shift to shade-loving species less conducive to fire.

On the surface, mesophication might look like a tool to help mitigate wildfire severity. However, most experts agree that mesophication is bad for the ecosystem—it limits biodiversity, changes ecosystems, and when fires do occur during dry periods, it provides ample fuels that encourage extreme wildfires.

Instead, lead study author and University of Florida professor Dr. Victoria Donovan touts the importance of prescribed or cultural burns.

Fire suppression efforts have intensified in the last 100 years, Donovan told Newsweek. Although mesophication is not something to strive for, it gives a vital outlook on one key point: attempting to suppress fires doesn't eliminate them; rather, it encourages an ecosystem that is extremely susceptible to fires when they do occur. Instead, Donovan believes that fire mitigation efforts should shift to cultural fires, a land management effort enacted by indigenous peoples prior to Euro-American settlement and colonization.

"I don't believe mesophication is a potential path forward for preventing wildfire," Donovan said, adding that fire suppression has driven mesophication. "The best path forward is...reintroducing fire as prescribed fire so we can help to manage fuels and reduce fire risk.

"It's important for people to recognize that fire is a natural component of ecosystems in the eastern U.S., and we need to prepare for the fact that these fires will occur," she added. "It's clear we can't remove fire from these systems. That's what we've been trying to do for the last century. We need to learn how to adapt and live with fire in these systems."

Similar situations occur on the West Coast, where fire suppression efforts have led to the growth of fire-intolerant species like silver and white firs. The presence of these species heightens the risk that wildfires will be severe when they do occur, given the ample fuel.

Bart Johnson, professor emeritus at the University of Oregon, adopts a similar view to Donovan's.

"The solution to having less catastrophic wildfires sweeping through the landscape, ironically, is to reintroduce cultural fire stewardship to reduce fuel loads and encourage fire-adapted ecosystems that can carry fire safely across the landscape," Johnson told Newsweek.

However, reintroducing prescribed fires doesn't mean lighting a match and setting the forest ablaze. Johnson said the preparation can take years and often involves manually thinning trees, restoring native grasses, and more.

The resulting smoke from the burns also needs to be considered, as more people have moved into wildland-urban interface areas and could endure negative health impacts from inhaling smoke.

However, the dilemma is that without prescribed burns, uncontrolled wildfires could burn more severely, destroying homes and releasing more hazardous smoke.

"Unless we face the challenges [of cultural burns] and do that, we will get stuck in an awful dilemma where we try to exclude all fire from the landscape, and then when it comes, it's extreme wildfire," Johnson said.