Prescribed burning will continue this fall

A prescribed burn conducted by Tahoe Douglas firefighters on Kingsbury generated smoke visible across Carson Valley for three days until Saturday.

Firefighters will be taking advantage of recent moisture to conduct burning all around Lake Tahoe over the next few weeks.

“We are still finalizing our burn plans and hope in the next week or so we will start operations in the Sierra Zone,” Humboldt-Toiyabe Fuels Specialist Steve Howell said on Sunday.

The Forest Service has a 30-acre pile burn from the work done above Genoa to conduct, still.

Once the storm passes today, members of the Tahoe Fire & Fuels Team will continue prescribed fire operations this week in the Lake Tahoe Basin. Conditions and weather permitting, California State Parks, Nevada Division of Forestry, North Lake Tahoe, and Tahoe Douglas fire protection districts will be burning piles in several locations around Lake Tahoe. Smoke will be present. A map with project details is available for viewing at www.tahoelivingwithfire.com

“Prescribed fires are an important tool used by land managers to help protect communities by removing excess vegetation (fuels) that can feed wildland fires,” team official said. “Burning excess vegetation also benefits forest health by making room for new growth which provides forage for wildlife, recycles nutrients back into the soil and helps reduce the spread of insects and disease in forests.”

Fall and winter typically bring cooler temperatures and precipitation, which are ideal for conducting prescribed fires. Each operation follows a specialized burn plan, which considers temperature, humidity, wind, vegetation moisture, and smoke dispersal conditions. All this information is used to decide when and where to burn.  

Signs are posted on roadways in areas affected by prescribed fire operations, email notifications are sent to the prescribed fire notification list, and the local fire information line at 530-543-2816 is updated. The TFFT gives as much advance notice as possible before burning, but some operations may be conducted on short notice due to the small window of opportunity for implementing these projects.  

To be added to the prescribed fire notification list, send an email request to sm.fs.paltbmu@usda.gov. 

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