"It's Kinda Nice To Win One"

Tonight fewer lights gleam on the horizon at the Fire City next to the Chiricahua Desert Museum, north of Rodeo. The nomads are pulling up stakes, some to head home, some to relocate in Willcox for the next stage of the fire work.

Horseshoe Two Fire map on 22 June 2011

Just look at that fire perimeter––they are still saying 95% containment, but it looks a lot like 100% to me!  That lovely black line means that the Horseshoe Two Fire isn't going anywhere, but it doesn't mean that it is 100% out. 

District Ranger Bill Edwards noted at last night's community meeting that the fire won't be out until the rains come––hotspots are still burning within the perimeter––and the current closure of Coronado National Forest won't be lifted until the Forest has received a soaking of at least 1/2" of rain, Forest-wide. Although many of us are impatient to see the mountains for ourselves, the continuing closure is wise, both in the interest of public safety in the burnt areas and for some degree of prevention of more human-caused fires in the unburned areas. The record dryness of fuels is still unprecedented. 

Today the fire crews planned to make "significant progress" with mopping up hotspots and rehabilitating the effects of suppression. Bulldozer work on the Whitetail road is nearly finished. BAER (Burned Area Emergency Response) crews were working today in the southern region of the fire, and other crews were being flown into the interior to assess the severity of the fire there. 

A last early morning briefing at Fire City (Photo by Narca)

In the more recently active MM Division, mop-up is continuing before rehabbing can start. 

In Chiricahua National Monument, hazardous trees are being removed. The southeast corner of the Monument burned at the highest intensity. Much of the rest of the Monument received a low-to-moderate burn. The prescribed burns that had been conducted in the Monument in recent years were an important factor in moderating the burn there.  

Today was a busy day for air operations, as they repositioned to Willcox, along with the Type 2 team which assumes command tomorrow morning. The fire city at Chiricahua Desert Museum north of Rodeo was being dismantled today, and the bulk of the teams is moving on.

Ranger Bill reviewed the work of our departing fire team led by Jim Thomas, the third Type 1 team to work on Horseshoe Two during the first 7 weeks of its duration. On arrival, they inherited a high-intensity blow-out which charred treasured regions of the Chiricahuas, including Rustler Park, Barfoot Park and lookout, and Onion Saddle. When they arrived, the fire was racing north, menacing Whitetail Canyon, Pinery Canyon, Chiricahua National Monument--all of the northern region of the Chiricahua Mountains. High winds generated firestorms in places like Whitetail Canyon.  Yet in spite of serious challenges, we are told that overall the fire team maintained a low-to-moderate intensity burn by using techniques like firing ridges in the evening, so that fire would back more slowly downhill into canyons, to meet the oncoming body of the fire. Without that active management, a far higher percentage of this range would have burned at high intensity. So the Type 1 fire teams managed to moderate a very, very bad situation. We were told last night that many of the "old fire dogs" had never seen conditions this extreme. 

Not only is the Portal-Rodeo community grateful for the firefighters' work, we are also glad that it happened without any serious injuries. Their safety record received high praise: during 169,000 work hours (so far) in difficult terrain, there were only 8 minor injuries. 

As a post script, I should say that fire danger continues in any unburned areas of our communities, even given the Forest closure. We still have lightning storms on the horizon, and groups of illegal entrants are still being seen about every other day, according to Bill Edwards. 

Just yesterday our next-door neighbors found a brand new campfire in the oaks next to our home, obviously built by illegals. Their fires are easy to identify by the nature of the trash left behind--the labels in Spanish on empty tin cans, the burlap used by drug runners to carry loads of marijuana, the ragged discarded blankets. (Now... about that program for allowing workers to enter legally, thereby eliminating at least one big part of the problem....)

Progress on Horseshoe 2 Fire

[If you've noticed that a couple of my most recent posts have disappeared, it is because Google's blogging platform was compromised, and has been out of commission for about a day. I'm hoping that the missing posts will reappear soon.]

Last night the most obvious (and spectacular) development in the Horseshoe Two fire happened along the south part of the eastern perimeter, where crews burned out land between Owl Butte Road and the oncoming fire. (Local residents who were blanketed in smoke, take heart: there was a bonus in addition to protection. Your road, at least, is now graded!) Results were excellent, and the eastern and northern areas of the fire perimeter are no longer considered dangerous. Today teams will be mopping up there, patrolling and extinguishing hot spots.

Alicia and Tom Davidson, and their mini-horses, live in the back-burned area. They reported a frightening night of fire, but also found the firefighters to be very professional and skilled, to the extent that they were even able to sleep once everything was underway.

A map of the Horseshoe 2 Fire on May 13, showing how it dwarfs and has curled around last year's Horseshoe Fire.

The most active and most worrisome corner continues to be in the southwest: holding it is key to holding the fire, and it is now the number one priority. Part of that corner (upper South Fork) fronts against the 1994 Rattlesnake burn, and a combination of the old burn and high cliffs are holding that edge rather well. But the fire is trying to spread south and west from the old burn, in country that is exceedingly difficult to enter. Today while the wind is calm and air support can be used, the fire team is dropping water there to slow the spread. You can see the critical points on this map.

Detail of fire map on May 13, 2011

Another worry is the finger of fire reaching into upper South Fork (indicated on the map above, "Major effort here too"). A crew hiked into South Fork yesterday to reconnoiter, and today they will anchor a line between two cliffs to attempt to stop that advance.

Along Horseshoe Canyon Road, crews will continue to build fire lines today and to prepare for burning from the road and fire lines, back to the spreading fire, to contain it there at the southern perimeter.

Up in the northwest, fire is slowly backing down into Cave Creek Canyon at Cathedral Rock, but it has not yet reached the point where it can be dealt with directly.

As for the numbers, 14,700 acres are estimated to have burned so far, and containment stands at 15%. 602 people have now come to join the effort. Today in the air attack, two heavy water tankers are on loan from Ft. Huachuca. In addition, 2 light, 2 medium and 3 heavy helicopters are working.

Bill Edwards, USFS District Ranger, addresses the firefighters 

(Photos by Narca)

Bill Edwards, the Douglas District Ranger for the Coronado National Forest, talked to the fire crews at this morning's briefing about the biological value of what they are fighting to save. Initially the focus was on saving homes and the village of Portal, as the greatest threat loomed there. Now that the public is relatively safe, and the fire has entered deeper into the Chiricahuas, the focus has shifted to minimizing the damage that this fire could do to the rich biodiversity. Bill spoke to the firefighters of the biological significance of the Chiricahua Mountains, of the high density of nesting raptors here, of the rare plant and animal communities, "so that you will know what you are fighting for." That biodiversity is also a primary economic base for communities in southeast Arizona.

Fire is a natural element in the local ecology. What isn't natural is the frequency of unseasonal, human-caused, catastrophic fire we've been experiencing. I've been researching fire ecology and adaptations to fire, and want to get into that in a later post. But for now, one tidbit of information lightens my heart: Arizona Madrone is indeed fire-adapted. Many of the burned madrone trees should root-sprout after fire. So although we may have lost some magnificent old-growth madrones when the north face of Portal Peak (behind my home) burned a few days ago, at least some of them should survive. It may be a few years before they bear berries again, but eventually Portal Peak will once more have food in the autumn for trogons and Eared Quetzals. (It was here that we found the only Eared Quetzal to be recorded so far on a US Christmas Bird Count, back in the winter of 1999-2000.)

Waiting for the Short-tails

A wait can be most engrossing. Today I returned to the Barfoot ridges in the Chiricahuas with Cathie Sandell, Christopher Rustay, and Noel and Helen Snyder, again watching for those two young Short-tailed Hawks and their parents. (Incorrigible, you say?)

At the very start of our vigil, Christopher spotted a fledgling Short-tail flying to a snag on a nearby ridge, prey clutched in its left talons. The buffy youngster perched for awhile, gazing around at the wide world, with no attempt to eat the prey it was carrying. Eventually the young hawk flew, and that was the last we saw of Short-tails for the day.

Pine Satyr, in the U.S. only found in the Chiricahua and Huachuca Mountains (Photos by Narca)

However, it was only the start of an interesting wait, high on the ridge. Hilltopping butterflies––Colorado Hairstreaks, Pine Satyrs, duskywings, cloudywings, sulphurs, blues, Weidemeyer's Admirals––lit in the Gambel's Oak and nectared at Penstemon.

In the U.S. Mexican Chickadees only inhabit Arizona's Chiricahua Mountains and New Mexico's Animas Mountains.

Eventually I wandered farther up the trail (although "trail" may be overstating it!) and found a good vantage point for a closer view of a ridge where the Short-tails like to perch. Several large, lichen-draped snags below my feet were home to a bustling family of Red-breasted Nuthatches, a pair of House Wrens, a family of Yellow-eyed Juncos, and the occasional Mexican Chickadee.

Red-breasted Nuthatch

Young Yellow-eyed Junco

As I hiked back, a sudden insect-like buzz announced the presence of a Twin-spotted Rattlesnake. The species is very rare in the US, and the Barfoot region is known for harboring one of the finest populations. Indeed, we hope that the Coronado National Forest plan will grant their habitat here some additional level of protection.

Twin-spotted Rattlesnake

And still we wait for the Short-tails...