Living and adapting to fire's environment

SEELEY LAKE – Paintings, photographs, prints and quilted images of wildland fire hung on display in the Seeley Lake Community Hall Saturday, Sept. 29. Every image told a story and each piece invoked different reactions and conversations from those who engaged. The art was meshed with a presentation on the newest fire science to foster conversations about how to deal with wildfire in the environment.

University of Idaho Department of Forest, Rangeland and Fire Science Professor Penny Morgan and UID Associate Professor of Art and Design Stacy Isenbarger curated the "Conversations Through the Smoke" art exhibit from 15 fire managers, firefighters and others.

Along with the art, Morgan shaed the newest fire science. Missoula City-County Health Department Air Quality Specialist Sarah Coefield also discussed the effects of smoke and lessons learned from the 2017 fire season.

Morgan's research focuses on where, when and how fires affect forests and the post-fire recovery. Through discussions with people in the communities living with fire, she has also become interested in how the actions taken by communities before, during and after a fire aid in the post-fire recovery for the people.

"I came across this old proverb - fire is a bad master but a good servant," said Morgan. "If you think about the history of fire with people and on the land, fire can be something that rules us or it might be something we can use well. Let's figure out how we can use it, adapt and live with it knowing that there is going to be fire."

Morgan said the role fire plays in the environment includes recycling nutrients and renewing habitat for fire-adapted plants and animals. While the acreage burned is reported based on the perimeter, fires burn in a mosaic with varying degrees of severity. Scientists have found that on the most extreme days, less than 50 percent of an area burned by a wildfire is high severity. This leaves pockets of unburned islands that are critical for vegetation recovery.

Across the west, warm, dry forested areas in low elevations are establishing less tree seedlings post fire. Prior to 2000, around 27 percent of the driest sites did not produce seedlings. That has increased to nearly 50 percent for fires after 2000. Morgan credits this to consecutive warm, dry summers.

Land managers are faced with selecting areas to plant to maximize survival with limited resources, money and time.

"Adapting our practices is going to be really important," said Morgan who added scientists are trying to help managers be strategic about what and where to plant.

Larger fires, fire seasons that are 84 days longer since 1970, economic costs, loss of revenue and more smoke are just a few of the challenges facing communities in fire-prone areas.

Coefield said twice as many people visited emergency rooms complaining about respiratory issues in 2017 compared with 2016. Because the particulates in smoke, known as PM2.5, are as small as one micron, they can bypass the body's nature defenses and enter the blood stream, setting off an inflammatory response.

"It is a systemic pollutant. It affects more than just lungs," said Coefield. "It affects the cardio vascular system, kidneys, neurological effects, joint swelling – it is a full body concern."

Coefield said in 2017 there was "a traumatic amount of smoke in Seeley Lake. I think it does hit the list of one of the worst smoke events on record in both the US and Canada."

In 2017, the Health Department learned how to better communicate with the public to help protect them from the harmful effects from smoke.

One of the messages that changed was the need to create clean air spaces inside buildings. If nothing was being done to filter the indoor air, "you might as well have been outside," said Coefield.

Coefield said there is currently no standard for filtration in buildings. Most filtration units are built with a Minimum Efficiency Reporting Value (MERV) 8 rating which is not sufficient to filter PM2.5.

The Health Department is working to create a standard for indoor air for wildfire prone areas. In the meantime, they are intercepting all the new building plans for Missoula County Public Schools and the Missoula Public Library to ensure the filtration system has a MERV 13 rating, a pre-filter and the outdoor air intake can be turned off to prevent the addition of more smoke.

The Health Department in partnership with Climate Smart Missoula also launched a new website, montanawildfiresmoke.org, to provide information about the health risks of smoke, current smoke levels and what people can do to stay healthy.

"We are going to keep getting smoke, we may as well prepare for it," said Coefield.

While there are many challenges, Morgan said there are opportunities.

"Fire is very powerful. It is going to change our landscapes, it is not only doing ecological benefits it is also threatening homes and other things," said Morgan. "What can we do so we see less loss and more awe?"

Through the discussion with those in attendance, many changes in perspectives were offered. Morgan feels every tool needs to be brought to the table and utilized to adapt and become more resilient to fire.

Fire was a tool used for hundreds of thousands of years by indigenous people to change the vegetation. Morgan said integrating western science with the traditional knowledge from both the tribes and others who have worked on the land is valuable in finding solutions.

Prescribed fire is another tool for land managers. Prescribe fires tend to produce less smoke and burns can happen on days when the smoke will create less impact for communities.

Morgan suggested allowing wildfires to burn during the shoulder seasons. While this would increase the days with smoke in the air, fires would burn under less severe conditions and allow fire to benefit the landscape. It also reduces the hazardous fuels, limiting the next fire.

"We should be celebrating that those fires have helped to manage the fuel that is out there, helped to increase habitat for some critters," said Morgan.

"Thinning the threat" is a popular bumper sticker in Idaho. Morgan said while fuel treatments do work, and they work especially well close to homes, logging is not necessarily fuel treatments.

"That can work in some places. But it is not going to take fires to zero, it is not going to take smoke to zero," said Morgan. "So how do you want your smoke?"

Coefield said there will be millions of acres of wilderness that will not be treated except through wildfire. One of the biggest challenges of prescribed fire is smoke. While it is a great tool, it can cause great harm to the community.

"It is super easy to say air quality is the reason we can't burn but [the Montana/Idaho Airshed Group] approves the vast majority of all the requests that we get because we know it is important," said Coefield. "It is hard and is always a balancing act. It is picking the right day and right conditions."

Morgan said a lot of things have changed. The climate has changed and it is harder to suppress fires compared to the mid 20th century. The number of mills, the technology in the mills and the number of people working in the woods have changed. This is partly due to the changing values for public lands.

Fire also brings economic challenges. Morgan has seen fire bring people together to help the community survive fire through community-based forestry projects.

"There are things that we can do but you need to find out what works in each community, what works in each kind of forest," said Morgan. "It's about the place and about the people."

"We tend to keep choosing what side we are on and telling the exact same story to the same people. Usually you need to take that 10 minutes and listen to that story that you have already disagreed with and hold onto that space and then figure out how to get passed it," said Isenbarger. "It takes a community to come together and start celebrating those stories. That might mean you need to tell the ugly story first to tell the good one but that needs to be taken up by the community in that space."

Conversations Through the Smoke is sponsored by the Northern Rockies Fire Science Network and UID. There are two more shows, Oct. 8-10 in Moscow, Idaho and Oct. 19 in Salmon, Idaho. Follow the Conversations in the Smoke Facebook page for more information.