Devastating fires in the West over the past several decades have increased in number and amount of acreage burned, paralleling changes that have taken place in federal and state agency’s land management.
Robert (Bob) Alverts, Science and Management Consulting and part-time faculty at University of Nevada, Reno, College of Agriculture, says that for the past three decades, between five-10 million acres of forest and rangelands have burned each year, most of which are in federal ownership.
These areas now have excessive fuel loads of beetle-killed timber, non-native annual grasses, and some vacant un-grazed allotments, leading to extreme fires that cost taxpayers millions of dollars in suppression costs, without counting post-burn rehabilitation and restoration costs.
Alverts says the shift in management by federal agencies—with the increase in fuel loads, and the consequences of invasive annuals like cheat grass and medusa head—has increased the risk for ranchers losing productive grazing land.
“We also know that the studies we’ve been doing using late-season grazing to reduce cheat grass with cattle can turn this around. The big problem is getting federal land managers to allow this. Most BLM and Forest Service allotments won’t allow late season grazing in their permits. We need to reevaluate and adjust the allotment management plans,” says Alverts.
“We need a paradigm shift in the whole philosophy of grazing. The agencies must acknowledge and recognize that invasive annual plant communities over much of the Western rangeland has become part of the permanent plant community and we have to manage accordingly. We need to account for the fact that these annual plants may produce 2,000 pounds per acre one year and 150 pounds the next.” The permittees need more flexibility of use.
“It should be outcome-based grazing instead of the current rigid adherence to a particular date on the calendar or time period,” Alverts opined. He added that the “rule book” for grazing is created in Washington, D.C., rather than on the allotments themselves.
A few districts, like at Burns, OR, are forward thinking and have led the work on late season grazing. “Their demonstration areas are showing what we can do, to turn things around,” Alverts says.
“Every BLM district seems to have its own autonomy; some are believers and others are not. This makes it challenging for permittees. We know there are huge short-term impacts on ranchers after a fire. They lose forage that year, and during the two- to three-year rest period for reseeded allotments. The BLM is using the calendar instead of the eyeball to determine condition,” says Alverts.
“We know that some plants are not well-rooted the first year and can be abused if grazed too soon, but that doesn’t mean we must always adhere to a two-year abstinence from grazing after rehabilitating the area. It should be a case-by-case situation.”
Bill Wilbur, a rancher in Oregon, whose BLM range burned in 2014, says that if ranchers can’t use the allotment for two or three years, they may end up with accumulation of un-grazed forage and more fuel for the next fire. “This was our situation,” he said, additionally opining there needs to be flexibility in managing that land.
Some well-managed grazing may be necessary, to reduce the risk of a bigger future problem.
“Arbitrary range set-aside is the norm everywhere unless you have a very cooperative local FS or BLM office. There is no evidence, that I am aware of, that shows setting aside that allotment for 2 or 3 years improves the situation. It usually makes it worse, for fire danger,” Wilbur says.
In many regions, increase in invasive annual plants such as cheat grass, medusa head, etc. that burn more readily than native species, and come in more quickly after a fire, have led to increase in number and severity of wildfires.
In California, many of the drier areas are also covered with brush, which burns hot and carries the fire a long way. Mark Lacey, president of the California Cattlemen’s Association, says part of the fire problem today is that some of the lands that used to be routinely grazed by livestock are not being grazed today.
“The state of California has invested in a lot of land—state parks, etc.—and eliminated grazing,” said Lacey.
Most parks (federal and state) were originally grazing lands and ranches, and the fire danger was much lower because of regular grazing by livestock, but now these areas have tremendous fuel loads.
Cheat grass has been around ever since seeds hitchhiked to this continent on immigrants and their livestock. It never was a big problem, however, until recent years.
“When I was a BLM manager in Oregon 45 years ago, it was not as prevalent,” says Alverts.
“It only grew around ditches and disturbed areas, rock pits, etc. In just a few decades it expanded over millions of acres. If we manage cheat grass (which we can do with proper grazing) we can marginalize it and bring back desired plant communities. Livestock are a wonderful tool, to do this, but we need the land management agencies to allow it.” — Heather Smith Thomas, WLJ correspondent
