Rx Fire in Pinyon-Juniper

The plan was to ignite a slash line built by the fuels crew last summer.  The heat and flame from the slash would ignite the adjoining tree crowns and the wind would push it from crown to crown.  There wasn't enough ground fuel to sustain a fire, so it had to be a crown fire.  Besides, it's always windy in southern Utah.  So, we each grabbed a couple of drip torches and hiked in to the slash line.  It was sunny and warm, but still.  Very still.  I got out my wind gauge:  Wind speeds of zero, with gusts to three.  The spot weather forecast had the winds picking up later in the afternoon, so we waited.  And waited.  By about 1500, I was getting winds of three, with gusts to seven.  Feeling like we had to do something, the firing boss sent me one way on the slash line, and sent Matt the other way.  It was a test fire.  I lit about 30 yards of slash and stopped to wait.  It didn't work.  Where the slash was piled directly against a tree, part of the live crown was consumed, but then it just went out.  Some gentle breezes swirled around, but not enough wind came up to push the flames.  Actually, I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it.  Conifer leaves are always flammable, and I figured we'd put enough heat into them that they'd pop, starting a chain reaction.  But, I guess the live fuel moistures were too high.  In any case, the burn boss called it off, and we hauled our nearly full drip torches back to the road.  That, as they say, is why you have a test fire.

Not Fuel Free

Last year, we were fuel free by April 22nd.  I don't think we're going to match that this time around.  We're still having nights in the 20s (it was 21F on Wednesday), and windy days in the 50s and 60s.  I'm still burning every morning, and sometimes in the evening, too.  And, of course, because it is April, we get a big snow storm just about every two weeks.  So, why write about it?  Because my brother-in-law, on the East Coast, invented the fuel free concept, and he sent me an email to celebrate it on April 8th.  Upstate New York enjoyed its first fuel free day of 2013 about two weeks ago.

Sage Grouse

On Friday morning, I met a couple of colleagues at the Bear Valley exit.  It was 5:50, and still dark.  The moon was new on Wednesday, so it was providing nothing but a sliver in the sky.  We drove over to Highway 89, turned north into the Sevier Valley, and went a few miles to the Dog Valley Road.  By the time we got to the little wetland formed by the dam on Echard Creek, the eastern sky was brightening.  We stopped along the western shore and got out of the truck.  It was cold (18F), but still.  The valley was full of the hoot of the sage grouse mating call.  We were in a lek.  We counted about 80 males strutting and calling.  We saw only around 10 females, so the ratio wasn't good, but the young men were undeterred.  They strutted, puffed, flared, peacocked, hooted, scuffled, and flapped for at least 90 minutes.  By about eight o'clock, the sun was high, the temperature was up to 25F, and, as if by signal, the boy birds packed it in.  They flapped into the air and flew straight down the canyon in a couple of large groups.  That was the signal for us, too, and we shuffled back to the trucks for the drive back to I-15.  The sage grouse would be back in the morning, doing what they'd been doing there for thousands of years—with, hopefully, more females doing it, too.

Clear Creek

I-70 starts in Baltimore; it ends here.  We hadn't really planned on camping so near the freeway, but the road to Three Creeks was still gated, so we had to choose Plan B.  I found this little alcove off the Clear Creek Highway with a few rocks to climb, and we called it good.  After thrashing around through the brush with the Chev, I was able to get the camper set up in a nice spot for the night.  The forecast was for 35F, but it must have hit 25F.  I was up trying to get the fire and the coffee started when EDO came out to use the groover.  "Dad," she said, on her way back to her sleeping bag, "there was ice on the seat."