FIRST PUT OUT THE FIRE

There is nothing new, normal, natural, or inevitable about what we are witnessing... What we are witnessing is not “the new normal.” Nor is it a direct result of “climate change.” It is the downstream result of congressional/federal failure to control three decades of uninterrupted tree growth in national forests that hold too many trees for the natural carrying capacity of the land.

A new way to visualize the alarming increase in atmospheric CO2 emissions.

I have been writing about the wildfire crisis in our national forests for 30-plus years – long enough to have developed a solid understanding of it underlying causes.

Our national forests belong to all Americans. Our forests - the legacy to the next generation - are not political pawns to be bought and sold.

The time has come for society to consider alternatives to fires so large that they escape suppression efforts, often with deadly consequences. If we don't like the fire trajectory we are on – and I don’t - shouldn’t we try something different?

We are featuring an interview with Brett L'Esperance, CEO and one of the owners of Dauntless Air, an aerial firefighting company that recently moved its maintenance facilities to Pappy Boyington Field, in Northern Idaho.

Frank Carroll, a Colorado forester and wildfire expert, speaks with Evergreen founder, Jim Petersen, concerning managed fire and his assessment of Petersen's book "First, put out the Fire!"

When will Congress address every pandemic with the same concern?

This is the tenth part of "Felt Necessities: Engines of Forest Policy," a series of essays tracing the history of the conservation movement in the United States, and its influence on the nation's ever-shifting forest policy.

Part 11 of this series is a lecture that Evergreen Founder James D. Petersen presented to a graduate-level forestry class at the University of Idaho in January 2020.