A repaired dozer line on the east of Gold Creek Peak on the Liberty Fire.
This is a map of the burn severity across the Liberty Fire. The majority of the soil burn severity was moderate at 35 percent. Twenty-nine percent of the area was unburned and 23 percent was with the low severity. The high severity, and area of greatest concern to landowners, was 13 percent, with 2,414 acres on tribal lands, 1,084 on Forest Service and the remaining 674 acres on The Nature Conservancy.
Before repair work done on a tributary in Boles Meadow.
After repair work done on a tributary in Boles Meadow.
SEELEY LAKE – The repair efforts on the Liberty Fire are nearly complete with only a few roads still needing work in the Gold Creek area. The Nature Conservancy Resource Advisor for the Liberty Fire Steve Kloetzel said the number one goal for TNC was collaboration with the Montana Department of Natural Resources and other agencies to get the work done to stabilize the area following the suppression actions. He has been happy to see carnivore use in the burn area has not changed since last summer.
The Liberty Fire was a lightning caused fire first detected on July 15, 2017. It burned more than 32,000 acres approximately 13 miles southwest of Seeley Lake with a price tag of $20.6 million.
The fire burned 13,503 acres of Confederated Salish and Kootenai tribal lands, 10,517 acres of the Lolo National Forest on the Seeley Lake and Missoula Ranger Districts and 8,001 acres of private Nature Conservancy lands. While no state land was burned, TNC contracts with DNRC for fire suppression.
The soil burn severity map showed that approximately 48 percent of the burned area experienced high or moderate soil burn severity, the areas of highest concern. Increased post fire soil erosion and runoff are likely to occur within and downstream of the moderate and high soil burn severity areas and may result in localized flooding, scouring and/or deposition of materials.
Once the fire was no longer active in the drainage, managers started repair work. Crews worked hard to get all the repair work done before the snow flew. Kloetzel said almost all of the repair work was completed with the exception of 40 miles of road grading in the Gold Creek area.
"At one point they had 12 excavators on the Liberty alone [doing repair work]," said Kloetzel.
The general repair objectives, as outlined in the Liberty Repair Plan, included: firefighter safety; repairing damaged infrastructure; minimizing vegetation disturbance and soil erosion; minimizing sedimentation into streams, wetlands and/or drainages to maintain water quality; minimizing noxious weed spread; minimizing impacts to fire and aquatic organisms; protecting cultural resource sites; restricting undesired access motorized travel and re-establishing preexisting road closures; removal of suppression related material; prevent non-system trail development and minimize potential impacts to threatened, endangered and sensitive species.
DNRC reported repairing nearly 60 miles of dozer line; four miles of handline; 0.33 miles of plow line and 137 miles of roads across all ownerships. There were also nearly 40 sites including drop points, helispots and staging areas that were repaired.
The dozer and handlines were the number one priority for repair because "They pose the greatest erosion risk in the spring time. They were either straight up, straight down or tied into a creek and were the great conduits for erosion," said Kloetzel. "A lot of the repair is focusing on less revegetation and putting more woody debris and slash [on the ground] to help them recover naturally."
Noxious weed invasion is a point of concern across all landowners. Reseeding with native seed was done in areas where an adequate native seed bed was not present to prevent new infestations. Monitoring areas of known infestations and herbicide application will also be done this summer.
Kloetzel said the opportunities for commercial harvest are very limited since TNC lands were managed for commercial harvest for the past 100 years. They have not found anything that is reasonable for salvage. No salvage is proposed by the LNF.
Kloetzel said that it is too early to tell if planting is needed.
"In the Seeley side of the fire, it burned very patchy. There will be a lot of nature recovery and there will be a lot of natural seed rain from unburned areas that will help those areas recover on their own," said Kloetzel. He added that in the Gold Creek area where it burned the hottest they will monitor the recovery and would consider planting if needed.
Kloetzel said that many of the roads on TNC lands are still managed by the LNF. Any culvert replacement and maintenance is a collaborative effort.
The LNF identified several culverts that require cleaning and will continue to monitor the existing culverts during the spring runoff. The areas that burned the hottest and are the areas of most concern include south side of Black Mountain and the south side of Gold Creek Peak in the Gold Creek drainage.
The Forest Service is also responsible for the snag mitigation on the roads. Kloetzel said that has been taken care of but "I strongly recommend people carry a saw with them when they travel anywhere in the forest."
In terms of public access, nothing has changed. In fact, Kloetzel said access has increased for snowmobilers. A main line connector trail for snowmobiles from Boles Meadow to Gold Creek that used to be nearly inaccessible was opened up as a main access road and used as a fire line. "Now they can drive the groomer down it," said Kloetzel.
The user-created hiking trail from Wild Horse Saddle to Gold Creek Peak became a fireline. Kloetzel said that when they repaired it, he made sure that it was maintained for hiking and mountain bikes. There still needs a little work but Kloetzel plans to take a crew out this spring.
The LNF will have Burned Area Warning signs posted to provide safety to motorists, trail users and campers. Post fire effects such as falling trees, rolling rocks and flash floods increase the risk to human life and safety.
Kloetzel said TNC is in their third year of forest carnivore monitoring. They contract with Swan Valley Connections to do the fieldwork because they wanted to get a baseline for wolverine and lynx use and population in the area. The Liberty Fire area was some of the core area where they were finding lynx and wolverine.
"It is interesting. We are still finding about the same amount of use, even in the burned area," said Kloetzel. "[The animals] really like the edge between the USFS lands and Plum Creek lands because it has the diversity in age class.
TNC anticipates holding a public meeting on the Clearwater Blackfoot Project either this spring or early summer. They hope to further discuss the recreation potential in the area, potential land exchanges and the results from the winter carnivore survey this winter. TNC also hopes to host some field tours this summer to help engage the community on other management ideas including a community forest.
For more information Kloetzel can be reached at skloetzel@tnc.org or call 406-214-2036.
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