Q. Can foresters manage resources to reduce wildfires?
A. According to statistics from the Society of American Foresters, wildfires burned between 20-50 million acres across the country around the turn of the century. Through education, prevention, and control efforts, this number has been reduced by 90 percent to 2-5 million acres annually. By removing excess fuels such as underbrush and trees through cutting and prescribed burning, foresters can make forests more resilient to wildfire.
Q. Is herbicide use necessary and does it affect wildlife?
A. Herbicides continue to be an important tool for site preparation or release treatments. In fact, herbicides have less impact to soils and are more effective than mechanical site preparation. When used according to labeled rates, direct effects of herbicides are minimal. Most of the commonly used forestry herbicides are extremely low in toxicity and short-lived in the environment. Indirect effects of herbicides on wildlife species vary depending on the herbicide. Herbicides are somewhat selective in the plants controlled. For example, some herbicides affect primarily broadleaf plants including trees, but have little effect on grasses (e.g. 2,4-D). Other herbicides affect a variety of plants except for legumes, which are important wildlife plants (e.g. imazapyr). Still others may affect a wider range of plant species (e.g. hexazinone and glyphosate). Indirect effects from herbicide use are the result of habitat changes. Regardless of the habitat change, some species will be benefited and others will be negatively impacted. Generally, if an area has a significant number of non-mast producing woody invasives that are thick enough to compete with forest regeneration, herbicide use will be beneficial to many wildlife species by eliminating these species and resulting in an increasing amount of low-growing herbaceous plants.
