Vince Grube, a member of the Mt. Adams Resource Stewards Stewardship Crew, lights a test burn to gauge how the landscape responds, and whether fuel moisture levels are low enough before the larger prescribed fire operation began on Oct. 15.
From left to right, Stewardship Crew members James Moore, Vince Grube and Nikki Launius monitor their progress on a small grass burn, done primarily for training purposes, on Oct. 15.
Smoke from a prescribed burn, intended to reduce hazardous fuels and mitigate future wildfire risk, rises northeast of Lyle on Oct. 15.
Nathan Wilson photo
Just outside the fire’s footprint, homeowners tap Mt. Adams Resource Stewards to light a prescribed burn
LYLE — A few miles up Centerville Highway and, in some places, mere feet from where the Burdoin Fire spotted and burned east of the Klickitat River just months ago, restorative, healthy flames swept across about 13 acres of land last Wednesday.
For the better part of this year, Bill and Rene Weiler, along with several neighbors near Oliver Point, have been trying to organize a prescribed burn. When the Burdoin Fire reached the east side of Alder Springs Road and threatened to crawl up a valley north of their property, the Weilers thought they were too late. Luckily, firefighters protected their log cabin, and a local nonprofit — Mt. Adams Resource Stewards (MARS) — conducted the burn at no cost.
“I was just so incredibly surprised and pleased that there was this group that was out there doing prescribed burns,” Bill said. “This is what we need.”
MARS started facilitating prescribed burns in 2022 and has incrementally conducted more every year since, treating 272 acres this spring and fall alone. Solidified as a regional leader in the practice, Washington’s Department of Natural Resources confirmed, its program has two core goals: Put more fire on the ground, and recover a knowledge base lost through the longstanding paradigm of fire suppression.
“There’s been such a deficit of intentional prescribed fire, beneficial fire in the last handful of decades that it’s caused a deficit of this knowledge and information we’re all collectively learning,” said Lucas King, fire and fuels program manager for MARS. “We want to reduce hazardous fire risk as well as restore fire to these fire-dependent ecosystems. More specifically, we want to learn how things respond.”
Prior to colonization, as King explained, landscapes burned with more frequency and less severity, particularly drier ones east of the Cascades that readily benefit from fire. Indigenous peoples have set cultural burns to enhance biodiversity; cultivate tribally important food, medicine, and weaving resources; manage wildlife; foster spiritual connectivity through ceremonies; and facilitate the intergenerational transfer of knowledge since time immemorial.
While now largely accepted as a management tool, scholars have documented how agencies like the United States Forest Service discredited cultural burning, often through tropes and faulty science, for a large part of the 20th century. Between 1984 and 2015, 13.3-18.9 million more hectares of Pacific Northwest forest would have burned if historic fire regimes administered by the tribes were restored, one study estimated.
Working primarily in Klickitat County, MARS moves between dense, mixed conifer forests to meadows to oak savanna ecosystems for prescribed burns, where King sees overgrowth and the impact of a disrupted cycle.
“It all would benefit from fire,” he said.
Vince Grube, a member of the Mt. Adams Resource Stewards Stewardship Crew, lights a test burn to gauge how the landscape responds, and whether fuel moisture levels are low enough before the larger prescribed fire operation began on Oct. 15.
Nathan Wilson photo
Through two different funding sources, Washington’s omnibus wildfire prevention legislation, House Bill 1168, and the Forest Service’s Community Wildfire Defense Grant, MARS assists landowners with prescribed burns free of charge. That includes a consultation, burn plan development, acquiring the necessary permits, site preparation and the burn itself.
Although MARS has a dedicated Stewardship Crew that performs burns, along with many other projects, it also co-founded a Prescribed Burn Association with Sustainable Northwest and Columbia Land Trust that hosts regular meetings, trainings and opportunities to participate in prescribed burns with little to no prior experience.
“What we're really trying to do is promote this idea of landowners, community members, really leading the charge on prescribed fire,” said Emery Cowan, coordinator of the association and the nonprofit’s prescribed fire program. “So, being the people holding the line, lighting the fire, with potentially a little bit of technical support from MARS staff and crew when needed.”
Holding and firing
The Stewardship Crew assembled bright and early in the Weiler’s living room for a 9:30 a.m. briefing last Wednesday, Oct. 15. The aim was to burn 20 acres spanning three properties, and King, who was also serving as burn boss, laid out the conditions as the others enjoyed coffee and warm brownies.
“Today’s weather is supposed to be sunny all day, no chance of wetting rain, no chance of lightning,” said King, noting that season-ending moisture is likely coming soon. “The forecast is light winds becoming west five to eight late in the afternoon. Our mixing height, where our smoke is going to hit our transport winds, is up around 3,000 feet above ground level, so that’s pretty good.”
By that time, MARS had already posted signs along the highway alerting passersby to expect smoke, and coordinated contingency plans with High Prairie, Lyle and state fire personnel should something unexpected happen. A 1,000-gallon water trailer was on site as well, and several crew members had medical training.
“We haven’t done a lot of oak woodland burning in this area in this area,” King continued. “You’ll probably see some increased response from grasses and forbs, and less of a weed cloth holding that seed bank back.”
With enough heat, lower tree limbs may also experience an effect King called “thermal pruning,” which essentially builds up resistance to the next round of fire by eliminating vulnerable branches. By spurting new growth, forage should improve as well, and the crew established two monitoring plots to measure the myriad effects. That information-gathering phase, though, is more of a group effort.
“We’re going to rely pretty heavily on the landowners, too, whether it’s observational or more scientific, because you guys are here every day seeing the response,” King said. “Hopefully, we’ll see some change over one burn, but also we often see more change over subsequent burns.”
Then, the crew split off into holding and firing teams, reviewed their assignments and set off hiking up the already-cleared fuel break. With varying degrees of tree density, the to-be-burned area was a blend between oak savanna and oak woodland habitats. Snowberry shrubs were prevalent throughout, however, serving as potential ladder fuels and a key reason why the Weilers and their neighbors sought out the nonprofit.
“We know that once fire gets up into the canopy of a tree, it could get pretty dicey,” Bill said.
In order to gauge fuel moisture and whether the area was ready for a full-fledged burn, the crew lit a small section in the shade and sun using drip torches, but it didn’t take well. After waiting and trying different portions along the fuel break, King eventually decided to leave the trees and head for an adjacent, much drier meadow.
From left to right, Stewardship Crew members James Moore, Vince Grube and Nikki Launius monitor their progress on a small grass burn, done primarily for training purposes, on Oct. 15.
Nathan Wilson photo
While not originally planned, burning an approximately 100-by-100-yard area of grassland provided a valuable training opportunity for the crew, and as expected, fire caught quickly. With a lunch break beforehand, the crew returned to the original parcel around 2 p.m., finding success on south and east-facing slopes that received more direct sunlight. All told, they cleared the undergrowth from 13 acres in a mosaic pattern.
“It takes a lot of coordination to get the ball rolling, start preparation, get permits and complete a burn plan,” said Cowan. “Many, many months of work are coming to fruition right now.”
To request a consultation from MARS about whether your property would benefit from prescribed fire, visit mtadamstewards.org, and to join the Prescribed Burn Association, go to mtadamspba.org.
