THE UNIVERSITY DAIRY KANSAN
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 8.2009
NEWS
5A
NATIONAL
Wildfires ravage California's Angeles National Forest
BY ALICIA CHANG AND JOHN ANTCZAK
Associated Press
LOS ANGELES — Southern California's huge wildfire has turned nearly a quarter of the 1,000-square-mile Angeles National Forest into a moonscape of barren mountains looming above thousands of homes that now face the threat of flash floods and mud-slides.
Experts are already evaluating the extent of risk to lives and property as well the impacts of the wildfire on a forest ecosystem that in some areas may not have
A deer escapes a wildfire in the Angeles National Forest near Los Angeles. Southern California's huge wildfire has turned nearly a quarter of the 1,000-square-mile Angeles National Forest into a moonscape of barren mountains looming above thousands of homes that now could face the threat of flash floods and mudslides. Experts are already evaluating the extent of risk to lives and property as well the impacts of the wildfire on a forest ecosystem that in some areas may not have burned in at least a century.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
burned in at least a century.
The chief concern is the effect the 246-square-mile Station Fire is having on the watershed. Countless canyons, ravines and mills formed
watercourses toward communities at the forest's edge.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Works maintains a legendary flood-control system including 14 major dams, 500 miles of open storm channel and a nearly 3,000-mile network of underground storm drains capable of carrying storm water and debris through the metropolitan region to the ocean.
"Any kind of rain is going to be a mess."
The system also includes basins — 30 to 40 in the area affected by the fire — that intercept debris laden flows from the canyons and trap mud and vegetation before the water continues on.
"Our concerns are that we will have a larger quantity of debris than normal being captured by our flood control system and, primarily, that individual property owners may be impacted by mudslides or mudflows to their properties," said Mark Prestrell, public works deputy director.
An overall assessment to predict the water flow has already begun. The basins are being examined to
determine how much they may need to be cleaned out to create capacity, and channels are being examined to make sure they are free of obstruction such as overgrowth. Pestrella said.
That work will be done by Oct. 15, which the department marks as the start of the storm season, he said.
Although the Station Fire is now the biggest in county history, each element of the flood-control system was engineered for its portion of the watershed and has been tested by previous fires, Pestrella said.
Teams will also fan out to assess burned slopes to warn homeowners and determine if temporary structures need to be built.
he said.
"The system is nearing 100 years old and it has quite a track record for performing during these kind of events."
The biggest defense against disastrous flooding this winter may be the weather trend.
On June 30, most of southwestern California completed its fourth consecutive season of below-normal rainfall.
The region is in for more of the same, said Bill Patzert, the veteran Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist who investigates how climate variation is linked to oceans, including the El Nino warming phenomenon that sometimes leads to dramatically heavy rains in California.
Precipitation in downtown Los Angeles has been only 64 percent of normal in those years, according to the National Weather Service.
The current El Nino "is definitely wimping out on us," Patzert said.
Patzert cautioned that it doesn't take an E Nino to bring heavy
"The dice are definitely loaded. When you have a weak El Nino or a disappearing El Nino, it's a below-normal rainfall year," he said.
rains and the full picture of the risk the region will face from winter rains won't be known until after the fall — the major fire season in Southern California. He is certain there's trouble enough already.
In the forest, the consequences of the fire range from loss of wildlife and habitat to an indefinite closure of a vast area used for hiking, fishing, hunting, mountain biking and even commuting.
"Any kind of rain is going to be a mess," he said.
"I think you have a hard time designing a more destructive fire
For the thousands of hikers, much of the forest may no longer resemble the descriptions in "Trails of the Angeles," the bible for trekkers in the San Gabriels since the early 1970s.
from a hiker's standpoint," said Doug Christiansen, now co-author of the guide originated by John W. Robinson. "All that country
that it took out contains some of the most heavily used ... and some of the oldest hiking trails on the mountain range."
Christiansen said he and his wife hiked in the Angeles a few days before the fire.
"I feel like that was
I feel like that was probably my last glimpse of the mountain range as I knew it. It's going to be generations before it comes back," he said.
There's no doubt the massive fire killed off "thousands and thousands" of animals, mostly small mammals that could not escape
"I think you have a hard time designing a more destructive fire from a hiker's standpoint."
DOUG CHRISTIANSON Co-author, "Trails of the Angels"
the flames, said Peperdine University biologist Lee Kats, who has investigated the impact of wildfires on wildlife.
"We have some animals that don't have the best escape mechanism. While birds and larger animals can certainly flee, a lot of smaller ones can't." Kats said.
Of particular concern are rodents, reptiles and raccoons — animals that don't get a lot of attention, but play an important role
in forest wildlife diversity.
Scientists say it is too early to know what kind of long-term damage the Station Fire wrought on the forest ecosystem. Chaparral generally is highly adapted to a fire-prone environment.
But researchers are concerned that if chaparral burns too often, invasive weeds and flammable grasses could crowd out native shrubs, transforming the landscape.
"If we end up with these areas burning again in a couple of years for whatever reason, then you can end up actually changing native vegetation to exotic vegetation," said Travis Longcore, research associate professor of geography at the University of Southern California.
STATE
Black-footed ferrets'reintroduction bears mixed results, volunteers say
ASSOCIATED PRESS
OAKLEY — A recent count of the endangered black-footed ferrets found 26 of the mammals at two reintroduction sites in west-central Kansas.
Dan Mulhern, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said only seven of the animals were live-trapped. But he and 35 other volunteers who spent a week two weeks ago in the pastures where the ferrets had been released counted the others.
The ferrets, the nation's most endangered mammal, were released in 2007 and 2008 on the Smoky Valley Ranch owned by the Nature Conservancy and a ranch operated by Larry and Bette Haverfield in
Logan County.
The ferrets in Kansas will be monitored for five years before officials decide whether to reintroduce more.
"The capture success was lower than I anticipated," Mulhern wrote in his report. "Kits were still with their mothers, and while this made it easier to identify family groups, it may have reduced the overall above-ground activity."
One of the captured animals, a female who had been born wild in Kansas prairie, showed signs of having birth to kits, Mulhern said.
The Nature Conservancy's conservation director, Rob Manes, said that discovery likely means a third generation of ferrets has been born
Mulhern said the number of sightings was generally what he had expected. It means there are at least 26 ferrets on the two ranches, but there could be more, he said.
That's partly because finding the ferrets is a challenge for spotters. The animals are nocturnal and generally spotted only when someone shines a light on them and sees the reflection in their eyes. And the area where the animals live is not easy to traverse.
on the Kansas plains.
Mulhern said he was not sure why some release sites appeared to not house any ferrets. It's possible none were found because of the rough terrain, but it's also possible that the mammals became food for owls, Mulhern said.
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