Posts Tagged: CAL FIRE
New Additions to Bohart Museum Open House on Beetles
A Cal Fire display of bark beetles and a children's activity by Project Learning Tree California...
Project Learning Tree (PLT) California aims to "use trees and forests as windows on the world to increase students' understanding of the environment and actions they can take to conserve it."
Cal Fire senior environmental specialist Curtis Ewing examining a coast live oak with cankers and flatheaded borer damage.
Oak Woodland Conservation Workshop at HREC
http://hrec.ucanr.edu/?calitem=370498&g=6198
Create a Defensible Space During Wildfire Awareness Week
Despite recent rain in California, the state has experienced record dry conditions with the potential to result in an explosive wildfire season. California has declared May 4 -10, 2014 “Wildfire Awareness Week,” urging residents to prepare homes for potential wildfires.
"Creating and maintaining Defensible Space is critical for the protection of homes," said Chief Ken Pimlott, CAL FIRE director. "It has never been more critical to strengthen our fire prevention efforts in light of the elevated fire conditions we have been experiencing in California. We have increased our inspection staffing and now we need the public to make sure they, too, are prepared for the increased fire risk due to drought."
Homeowners can easily create a defensible space to help protect their home and improve the homes chance of surviving a wildfire through easy maintenance practices. A minimum defensible space of 100 feet around your home is required by California law (Public Resources Code 4291). Check with your local fire department for specific defensible space requirements in your area.
Creating a 100 foot defensible space around the home is oftentimes the easiest and most effective first line of defense in protecting a home against wildfires. According to Landscaping Tips to Help Defend your Home from Wildfire, the goal of the law is to protect your home while providing a safe area for firefighters.
Create a Lean, Clean and Green Zone
A buffer between structures and trees, grass and shrubs and helps slow or stop the spread of wildfire. Break the property surrounding your home down into two zones:
Zone 1:
Zone one extends 30 feet* out from buildings, structures, decks, etc.
- Remove all dead plants, grass and weeds (vegetation).
- Remove dead or dry leaves and pine needles from your yard, roof and rain gutters.
- Trim trees regularly to keep branches a minimum of 10 feet from other trees.
- Remove branches that hang over your roof and keep dead branches 10 feet away from your chimney.
- Relocate wood piles into Zone 2.
- Remove or prune flammable plants and shrubs near windows.
- Remove vegetation and items that could catch fire from around and under decks.
- Create a separation between trees, shrubs and items that could catch fire, such as patio furniture, wood piles, swing sets, etc.
* San Diego County requires 50 feet of clearance in zone one. Check with your local fire department for any additional defensible space or weed abatement ordinances.
Zone 2:
- Cut or mow annual grass down to a maximum height of 4 inches.
- Create horizontal spacing between shrubs and trees. (See diagram)
- Create vertical spacing between grass, shrubs and trees. (See diagram)
- Remove fallen leaves, needles, twigs, bark, cones, and small branches. However, they may be permitted to a depth of 3 inches.
Prepared homeowners are not only protecting their property but also providing a safe environment for firefighters responding to the call of duty. Visit California Garden Web or ReadyforWildfire.org for more information about preparing your home for wildfire season and fire-resistant landscaping.
The Goldspotted Oak Borer: Informing Others that the Threat Continues
The goldspotted oak borer (GSOB; Agrilus auroguttatus) continues to attack and contribute to the high mortality of tens of thousands of oaks in San Diego County and the threat to oaks throughout southern California remains a considerable concern. In effort to inform professionals who are responsible for the stewardship of oaks and oak woodlands, a series of workshops has been offered in six southern California counties in which oaks may be at risk: Ventura, Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino, Orange and San Diego. The overlying objective was to spread the knowledge of goldspotted oak borer and minimize the spread of this non-native insect into new areas. These day-long events offered multi-agency presentations, hands-on displays, outreach materials and in some locations, short field trips.
Figure 1. Dead oak trees due to GSOB Figure 2. Two Adult GSOB on penny
(Photo source: Tom Coleman, USDA Forest Service) (Photo source: Tom Coleman, USDA Forest Service)
In cooperation, the USDA Forest Service, CAL FIRE, and the University of California have partnered with other local agencies, tribes and organizations to provide these workshops. Presenters at each session were coordinated from a cadre of specialists and researchers. Key speakers included Tom Coleman, Paul Zambino, Sheri Smith, Larry Swann, Lisa Fischer and Matthew Bokach (USDA Forest Service and Forest Health Protection); Tom Smith, Kim Camilli and Kathleen Edwards (CAL FIRE);Tom Scott, Doug McCreary, Jim Downer and Kevin Turner (University of California Cooperative Extension); and Vanessa Lopez (PhD candidate in the Entomology Department, UC Riverside). Introductory workshops were held monthly from September 2010 through February 2011. Topics covered were:
- GSOB history and distribution
- GSOB identification and biology
- Ecological and economic impacts of infested oaks and oaks at-risk
- Integrated best management practices for GSOB infested and at-risk oak woodlands
- How to prepare for potential outbreak
- Utilization of GSOB infested oak wood
- Restoring oak woodlands impacted by GSOB
Figure 3. Larvae Feeding Galleries, seen in cambium Figure 4. GSOB larvae in firewood (Photo source:
of oak wood cross-section (Photo source: Tom Scott, UC Cooperative Extension)
Kim Camilli, CAL FIRE)
In early May 2012, two additional workshops were held to provide updates from on-going research, best management practices and mitigation and education efforts. The session on May 1st was held in Altadena in partnership with the Los Angeles County Fire Department-Forestry Division and the County Parks and Recreation Department. The following workshop, held on May 2nd, was hosted in partnership with the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians in Temecula.
Information Highlights:
- The goldspotted oak borer in an introduced, non-native beetle attacking and killing coast live oak (Quercus agrifolia), California black oak (Quercus kelloggii), and canyon live oak (Quercus chrysolepis) trees in San Diego County.
- The adult goldspotted oak borer (GSOB) Agrilus auroguttatus is a small, bullet-shaped beetle about 10mm (0.4 in.) long and has six golden yellow spots on its dark green forewings.
- Mature larvae are white, legless, slender and about 18mm (0.75 in.) long with two pincher-like spines at the tip of the abdomen. Larvae feed under the bark on the trunk and larger branches.
- Larval feeding kills patches and strips of cambium tissue beneath the bark, which causes dark staining and sap flow. The larvae pupate in the outer bark and leave D-shaped exit holes about 1/8 in. wide when they emerge.
- GSOB produce only one beetle generation per year.
- The goldspotted oak borer’s peak flight and breeding season is May through October.
- There is on-going research being conducted on biological and chemical GSOB control methods for preventative management; trees at various degrees of infestation; and the wood from infested, dead and felled trees.
- Currently, there are no effective treatments that can eradicate GSOB once it becomes established.
- Goldspotted oak borer larvae and pupae can survive under the bark of wood from large branches and trunks for up to a year after a tree dies.
- Currently, best management practices to minimize introduction of GSOB to new areas is to let wood cure at least two years after the tree dies before moving firewood from infested areas or grind wood into 3-inch particles.
- Before any type of treatment on oaks is initiated for GSOB infested trees or as a preventative measure on high-valued trees, a management plan should be developed first.
- There are no quarantines or zones of infestation in place by statewide authorities for GSOB; however, in 2011 the California Pest Council established the California Firewood Taskforce, a coalition of stakeholders that initiates and facilitates efforts within the state to protect our native and urban forests from invasive pests that can be moved on firewood.
- The Early Warning System is a citizen scientist program established to enlist the help of those concerned about oaks for the purpose of identifying oak tree health in southern California urban and woodland areas.
- Information and resources may be found on the Goldspotted Oak Borer website, www.gsob.org. To stay informed of current news, information and future training opportunities, we recommend you join the GSOB email list.
Figure 5. Tom Scott Workshop speaker
(Photo source: Lorin Lima, UC Cooperative Extension-San Diego)
Nearly 500 professionals attended these workshops. Findings from follow-up workshop surveys indicate that potentially more than 2,600 others will learn about GSOB through outreach extended by workshop participants. Although evaluation and survey responses point towards a successful series of GSOB workshops, the threat of further goldspotted oak borer attacks remains. As the peak emergence and flight season occurs during the same time of year of increased vacation travel and camping in southern California, we are all encouraged to share the news about GSOB and it’s threat to oaks with others along with the message to not move firewood – “Buy It Where You Burn It.”
For more information:
Goldspotted Oak Borer website: http://www.gsob.org
California Firewood Task Force: http://www.firewood.ca.gov
Goldspotted Oak Borer - The Center for Invasive Species Research, UC Riverside:
http://cisr.ucr.edu/goldspotted_oak_borer.html
Goldspotted Oak Borer – UC Statewide Integrated Pest Management: http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/NATURAL/index.html
Local Agencies & Landowners Team up to Stop Sudden Oak Death (SOD) Spread in Humboldt County
University of California Cooperative Extension employees, who coordinate most of the sudden oak death-related research and monitoring in Northern California, got a surprise in the spring of 2010, when samples from a monitoring station near the mouth of Redwood Creek near Orick in Humboldt County tested positive for the pathogen. This meant that trees were infected somewhere in the 200,000-acre watershed – more than 50 miles from the nearest known infestation, and farther north than the pathogen had ever been detected in California.
Federal and state agencies, including the USDA Forest Service, CAL FIRE and the Natural Resources Conservation Service, joined forces with UC Cooperative Extension and quickly mobilized resources to control the pathogen in Redwood Valley and halt its spread to neighboring forests. Local landowners have also played a key role.
Yana Valachovic, UC Cooperative Extension advisor in Humboldt County and forestry expert, explained that she and her agency partners had been preparing for this moment.
“We’ve been closely monitoring the disease for years and anticipating a scenario like Redwood Valley, so we were ready to take action and respond quickly,” Valachovic said.
Figure 1. Yana Valachovic sampling vegetation
The UCCE staff leads an extensive sudden oak death monitoring program on the North Coast, and one of their detection strategies involves "leaf-baiting" in streams. Using this technique, they “bait” Phytophthora ramorum, the non-native pathogen that causes sudden oak death, by placing susceptible leaves in strategic locations in North Coast streams. If the leaf baits become infected with SOD, the scientists know that the pathogen is present in the watershed without having to comb the landscape for symptoms.
After they detected the pathogen in Redwood Creek, UCCE acted quickly to pinpoint the source of the waterborne spores, scouring the watershed for the very inconspicuous symptoms of SOD with the help and permission of public and private landowners. By November 2010, the scientists had narrowed the location to Redwood Valley, where they found dead tanoaks and several other infected host plants.
Given its proximity to extensive public, private and tribal lands, the infestation in Redwood Valley was a serious concern. The disease, which was discovered in the Bay Area in the mid-1990s, is found in 14 coastal counties in California, from Monterey to Humboldt, and has infested 10 percent of the at-risk areas in the state. P. ramorum thrives in the coastal climate, and has killed over 5 million tanoaks and true oaks over the past 15 years. It’s still not clear how the pathogen got to Redwood Valley, but it could threaten the dense tanoak forests of the surrounding area, resulting in widespread tree mortality and increased fire hazard.
Much of the on-the-ground effort has been completed by contractors and CAL FIRE handcrews, who have created 100-meter buffers around infected trees by removing California bay laurel (pepperwood) and tanoak, the two hosts that most readily support P. ramorum spore production and spread. Infected plant material has been trucked offsite and donated to the nearby DG Fairhaven Power Company, piled and burned, or lopped and scattered onsite.
Funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the USDA Forest Service and NRCS enabled the swift response in Redwood Valley. UCCE used ARRA funds, also known as federal stimulus funds, to hire four people to work on the project, lending stability to the effort.
Landowner support has been critical to the success of the project, according to Valachovic. More than 20 landowners in the valley have allowed monitoring and treatment activities on their properties, recognizing that their cooperation may keep the disease from spreading to other areas.
Figure 2. Chris Lee (UCCE Staff Research Associate) and David Casey
(NRCS Forester) inspecting a treated area
“We couldn’t just stand back and let the disease roll through the forests that we manage, and the landowners understood that,” said Dan Cohoon, who works for Eureka-based Able Forestry, which manages many of the private forestlands in the watershed.
Brandon LaPorte, manager of Cookson Ranch and one of the key landowner collaborators in Redwood Valley, has supported the project from the beginning. LaPorte explained, “We’ve learned a lot about the disease through this project, and we certainly don’t want it getting worse here on the ranch or spreading beyond the valley.”
The first phase of treatment is currently wrapping up, and UCCE is beginning to monitor project efficacy and watch for spread of the pathogen beyond project boundaries. The Yurok and Hoopa tribes will be paying close attention to this effort, as they are only a ridge away from the infestation.
Ron Reed, a Yurok tribal forester, commented, “Oaks are an important part of our culture and history, and we will do what we can to keep sudden oak death out of our forests.
The Redwood Valley project highlights the value of stream monitoring as a detection tool for SOD, but it also demonstrates the ability of agencies and landowners to collaborate swiftly and effectively to protect the region’s forest resources. Maybe most important – regardless of the future course that sudden oak death takes in the North Coast – is what the project shows about the ability of proactive communities concerned about the health of their landscapes to come together, attract the support of state and national authorities, and work to make things better.
The community collaboration is being honored with the Two Chiefs’ Award. The award, which is given jointly by the NRCS and the Forest Service, highlights projects from across the country each year, recognizing exemplary partners who have worked collaboratively to support conservation and forest stewardship. Valachovic will accept the award on behalf of the federal, state, tribal and private partners involved the project at an event in Davis on Wednesday, May 16.
For more information about sudden oak death disease, visit the California Oak Mortality Task Force website at www.suddenoakdeath.org.
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