Human-Caused Wildfires & Wilderness

By Doug Hulmes, AWC Board Member and Faculty, Prescott College

While fire is part of the ecological cycles of most ecosystems in the West, humans have significantly influenced both ecosystems and intensity of fire by decades of fire suppression, previous management decisions, and introduction of exotic plants such as annual grasses that easily ignite. A number of wilderness areas in Arizona have been impacted by human-caused fires, and many of these fires were started outside of Wilderness boundaries. Combined with climatic change, human-caused fires are resulting in a dramatic alteration of ecosystems in the West.

Decision-making by federal agencies has made little distinction regarding the ecological impact of human caused wild fires versus natural lightning caused wildfires.

There is a need to scientifically study potential differences in magnitude and impact of natural versus human-caused fires related to Wilderness areas in particular, i.e., Slide Rock, Granite Mountain Doce fire, and the Wallow Fire, Rodeo/Chedisky, Daisy, Shultz, and most of the Colorado wildfires. We are potentially losing ecological communities on our Sky Islands, which is also being exaserbated by climatic change.

The assumption that Wilderness designations have limited agencies’ ability to manage ecosystems related to fire is flawed and needs to be balanced by scientific studies and clarification of procedures allowed by the Wilderness Act. In many cases, natural fires have been allowed to burn in Wilderness and have helped ecosystems by returning fire to more natural cycles, while allowing agencies to determine when and where fires need to be controlled when human lives and property are threatened.

Federal, State, and local agencies should be more proactive in reducing human caused fires through education, strict enforcement, closure of especially significant areas such as Fossil Creek, and establishing stricter and earlier bans on open fires and activities that cause fires by careless people. More public awareness announcements, and personal contact at entry points to forests and sensitive areas like Oak Creek Canyon should be implemented. Responses to threat of wildfires have generally been reactive more than proactive, often waiting until after a significant fire has occurred before initiating restrictions. This is often done out of concern for economic losses of revenue related to outdoor recreation. However, the cost of loss to critical natural areas continues to increase, and economic loss to local communities during fires as well as the long-term impact on popular tourist destinations must also be considered. The implications on infringements on personal freedoms related to the use of guns, fire and other factors that result in human caused fires must be mitigated.

Words and statistics do not show the destruction of ancient trees who have survived countless lightning caused fires, or dead and injured animals who could not escape the flames, or the charring of landscapes that for many of us are scenic and ecological treasures.