Final Environmental Impact Statement Rio de los Pinos Vegetation ...

Final Environmental Impact Statement Rio de los Pinos Vegetation Management Project
1996 Forest Plan revision. They are not related to the regeneration success of previous
management activities.
Forest Service Response to Comment 1-16:
Thank you for the comment. Adequate seedling protection is required in Forest Service planting
contracts, whether through hand-stacked logging slash (a common practice) or through artificial
tree shelters, which the Forest already owns.
Forest Service Response to Comment 1-17:
Please see Forest Service Responses 1-12 and 1-13. Planting estimates are based on current
regeneration stocking levels and current overstory mortality within each unit. See also Forest
Service Responses 1-15 and 1-16 concerning regeneration success and adequate seedling
protection.
Forest Service Response to Comments 1-18:
The EIS states a need to reduce long-term fuel build-up (FEIS Section 1.5, italics added). The
goal is to reduce the duration and intensity of a potential wildland fire by reducing the heavy fuel
loading that may at some point in the future burn with very high intensities and cause severe soil
damage. The Forest Service agrees that fires are rare in wet, high-elevation areas but
acknowledges that they have and do occur. Analysis is focused on potential severity rather than
fire risk.
Forest Service Response to Comment 1-19:
The Forest Service agrees that once the trees lose their needles and the needles become part of
the surface fuels there is little chance of a crown fire. However, later in time when the trees
begin to fall due root rot or wind, the loading of larger diameter fuels on the soils can burn at a
very high intensity and cause high severity to the soil.
Forest Service Response to Comment 1-20:
If a spruce tree falls and a large majority of the bole touches the ground, then rot does begin to
occur. However, if trees crisscross each other and subsequent layers of trees are off the soil
surface, they decay much more slowly. Sound spruce trees that have been standing for many
years, even decades, do not rot as quickly as stated in the comment when in this condition. The
existing regeneration that would grow up over the years would indeed provide some shelter to
the surface fuels, but the last statement “except during extended drought periods” is key.
Research has shown that there is a correlation between drought and high elevation fires (Sherriff
et al. 2001). Eventually there will be a dry period and if a fire occurs, the damage to soils could
be very detrimental to the watershed.
Forest Service Response to Comment 1-21:
Although harvest units do not adjoin private property, they do lie within ½ mile of approximately
630 acres of private land with structures. If fire becomes established in stands of beetle kill and
there is a heavy surface fuel load, they are very difficult to suppress and can easily move over
large landscapes before weather conditions change or suppression actions are successful.
Chapter 6 -- Response to Comments Page 6-5