Forest Fires!!

[monkeymonk]

This is the 5th season Between srping and fall and it shares summer.

Fire Season (goes hand in hand with bear season)

Currently we have 14 good size fires burning up round us and I mean ALL around us! They have names like Uncles,H*ll Hole, Rush,Rays, I am up,Caribou,Haypress,The near Mary blane,Taylor, Poison....the list and names go on..........most are names miners gave to the areas in the old days.

There are actually 30+ burning including the orleans complex and six rivers
which are just on the other sid of us but far enough away.

Resources are spread thin around the west with all the lightning storms it's hard to keep up, their just letting some burn like H*ll Hole 600acres, and uncles 250 and Caribou wilderness fire 600acres (being watched since the strike's).and two or three others that are bigger. Seems like a few of the big ones are gonna burn till they run out of fuel or the rains come (1987 fire)

Some are so remote they can't get enough fighters in there to surpress it safetly with squadrens spread out everywhere. They work on one, surpress it mop up(make sure its out GOOD) and move on to another one some times going back to another one they just surpressed long enough to get to the next. Some are just getting Retardant after Retardant dropped on em.

These fires are burning in heavily forested areas(N.F. and wilderness)
You can look up and see plumes in every direction, Thick to light smoke in areas raining down ash in others depending on which way the winds a blowing. It's good and bad....wind keeps the plumes and smoke high But fuels the heck out of the fires. Although it is smokey out its not so smokey you can't see your tractor from the porch!Yet.

Me well the last two days I have been making sure the Whole meadow and forest surrounding is wet! as well as my fresh sawn lumber.. as far as the sprinklers and hoses can go. The water tanks are full and the water trailer is road ready, Tools and all.
The threat isn't imediate but you never know where that ember that blew over is gonna spark or the neighbor up Taylor is gonna need some help.
Lucky us theres a river to fill up with and swim about in the smokey heat.

I'll try to take some photos and pos

 

[California]

I'll try to take some photos and pos ... ... ...

I hope that abrupt end wasn't the generator going down!

Hang in there Bro.

I used to spend every spare minute up at the mining claim in way-remote Plumas county. Occasionally it would be like that, fires in every direction and real spooky. But at least we could evacuate (and did, a couple of times) when things got a little too edgy.

Homesteading is a whole nother commitment. Are you sure that place is suitable for permanent habitation? I'm sure you love it but just be ready to abandon ship if there's no alternative.

 

[DANOCHEESE]

Maybe we should log a few of those areas!!!

Earth First, We'll log the other planets later.

Ok it is Friday I don't mean to start anything. I spent two years in the Almanor basin and know what you are dealing with. Good luck. If we don't get some rain here in Minnesaota we will have corn field fires soon.

 

[monkeymonk]

No need to worry I'am at our spot on the river the road is right here, and to inhabitable,well not too to too but compared to the other place we lived at 12 miles to anybody on the top of the ridges, and our other spot 40acres that burned out in 1987 and is now a brush field I feel very safe.

They evacuated one of our up river neighbors by helichopter today the trail was engulfed and they really didn't know the status as they have no phone etc... just smoke and such

Spooky as can be I had a friend call from down river about 30miles and he said he was watching the fire (orleans complex) creep over the ridge and down exploding tress like fire crackers....He got a real shock when I told him we were on fire up river as well and their so spread thin he better get out and prep his place like a mad man with water and brushing because their probably just gonna evac him if it jumps and be careful of a premature Evac.

For us we are preping for the long haul, Its only jully and this could go on till the rains.Lets hope not, but thats life. so far we have 2-3,000 gallon tanks, 2-300 gallon tanks and one 500 gallon tank ready and waiting along with 2-pumps and around 1,000 feet of fire hose....Evac? not to sure I may want to watch it burn or scramble at the last ditch effort. Shake and Bake!

Sorry danocheese but logging is not the answer for forest fires, Proper forest management 40 years ago would have been better as well as not putting every single fire that started out 80 years ago so that now the forest floors are so built up with fuels we have a catistrophic fire at the stike of a match. Controled burns work when done right as well as plantation and fuels treatment that may require harvesting some timber as well. Although I'd like to harvest some Corn right now as we didn't get around to planting any this year

I'll trade you Douglas Fir for some Corn?

friday=Beer thirty all day

 

[monkeymonk]

This is it, today was a long one........clearing,brushing cutting lines around the property. Tommorow will be spent at the neighbors places up river.

Just gave the Heli-tac crew the go ahead on our 26acre river piece down the road,the air ships are coming in full force tommorow HOPEFULLY. their making camp much closer and bigger. Most still don't think the fires gonna be out till fall? we'll see?

Tommorow will be picture day!

 

[rox]

monkeymonk,
reading about your current situation wiht the fires has given me heart palpitations. We had to evacuate last year, had a forest fire to the east and north of us. The eastern edge as stopped on our property and the norther edge at our neighbors property. The next day it flared up again and amazingly burned against the really really strong winds. it burned to the west.

Our 5 Canadair firfighting planes were grounded as a tail had fallen off one the week befrore and 3 air crew members ahd died. They als don't fly at night. It was scary as **** watching the fires advance all through the night.

We were saved by firefighters from the city of Verseilli to the east and firefighteres form Nice to the north. Last year could be known as the Big Burn, remember the fires in Portugal and Span last summer?

If the Canadairs had been flying during the day that fire would have been out and never would have advanced towards us. I am a huge fan of arial firefighting. They bought some helicopters last year and the next day one helicopter probably made 50 to 75 trips dropping his bucket of water at the edge of our property where there was still smoke the next day.

It is incredible the amount of stress you feel because of fear. Liek you said, the thing is with forest fires you see the fire advancing for hours before it gets to you. It is not like a house fire that "zip" goes up in falmes. You see the fire off in a distance, it takes hours and hours to advance to you, all the time you are hoping and praying that the firefighters get it put out. That is stressfull.

Keep us posted on your current situation, I for one amd very intersted and hoping your property is spared.

 

[Mace]

I am a volunteer fire fighter here in Utah. We have had our share of the fun. Not as bad as Cali or even now in the Dakota's.....

Last night was the fourteenth night in a row the pager went off. Between that and 12 hr shifts at work, my little 5 acres is really being neglected.

The closest fire was just shy of 3000 acres and burned to within a half mile of the homestead.

Hang in there bro! Fall is coming...We just need to get through August.....Oh yea....that's the real fire season, isn't it?

I whole heartilly agree with the logging. Our wild areas are so overgrown with so very many years of fire suppression that now the game is fire containment and fire hoping it can be stopped rather than fire control.

 

[monkeymonk]

Day?

Still smokey! Scattered thunder,lightning today.Spotter planes can't see,Helitack can't see,I can't hardly see...smoke is really getting to some folks. 10,000 acres are burning round here with smoke from about 25,000 acres pouring in from other fires not to far as the crow flies.
The fire should be lying down with all the humidity we are experiencing today, were also experiencing extra thick smoke with that humidity and inversion layer.
good news is I went up to fire camp and picked up a new pair of Whites Boots at a discounted price...Yeah...the perks of a fire.

Here are some picks from last week on the orleans complex, for some reason or another i haven't taken many pics round our place.....maybe cause its to smokey and you really can't see the plumes anymore from up high or low?

 

[EddieWalker]

Steph and I just got back from a 4,780 mile trip throught out the Rockies and Western states. We saw about a dozen forest fires in the distance, but it wasn't until we got to Ft. Worth that we saw one up close. It was about a ten acre grass fire along Highway 287 two miles West of Interstate 35W.

When we drove by, there was one fire truck at one edge of it with the fire spreading rapidly away. There was also several other fire trucks on the way and the weather was just about to start raining. A few miles East of Ft. Worth, it really started raining, so maybe the rain put it out.

Eddie

 

[willywildes]

is that the Helli that crashed? my brother in law watched one come apart and go down.My father in law is over seeing the clean up and removal from the creek.