On Global Warming
I’m having my first personal experience with living with fire. Some years ago, when Sarah, Benjamin and I went to the Hopi Reservation on a community service trip with Global Citizens Network, we had a taste of fire. The fires were a hundred miles away, but the smoke hung below the mesa where we were living, and I would wake in the night to the scent of fire approaching, in the morning, to slightly stinging eyes. We visited the Grand Canyon that summer, and could not use an open flame in our campground to cook, because of the high fire danger.
The kids and I first came to Yellowstone in 1992, 4 years after the devastating fires that had consumed more than a million acres in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. My perspective has mostly been that of a fascinated observer, wondering at the recovery of the forests, the unique mechanisms of the lodgepole pines to release seeds after the heat of fire, the flowers and grasses emerging in the newly lighted burned forests. I’ve seen the film footage of the valiant efforts of the firefighters, even visited the gulch on the Missouri River where smokejumpers died in a horrific fire (read Norman MacLean’s Young Men and Fire), but I’ve certainly never felt the vulnerability.
On July 17 a fire began in a lodgepole pine forest about ten miles west-northwest of where I am living and working. The fire was started by a lightning strike. One of the frequent phenomena here is the “dry thunderstorm”, one that sweeps through with lots of thunder and lightning but no water. The area where the fire began is in the heart of the 1988 fire, but a small pocket that was unaffected, so there’s plenty of fuel for the fire. Unlike our New England forests, the forests here experience relatively little rot and decomposition of downed material because it is so arid. The Park Service’s position on fire was highly controversial during the 1988 fires which were a media sensation. An exhibit in the Grant Village Visitor’s Center highlights the sensitivity of the topic with the Park Service folks, who were widely chastised for allowing Yellowstone to burn. In fact, the current Park Service position makes a lot of sense to me. Fire is an inherent natural part of the functioning of the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem. Those fires that are of natural (i.e. not man-made) origin are permitted to burn, although attempts are made to protect buildings and archaeological resources. Of course, in populated areas, every effort is made to protect life and property, and trails are closed in the area of fires, but fires, while monitored, are allowed to burn.
Currently the fire, known as the Magpie Fire, has burned somewhere around 850 acres. The humidity was higher for several days this week, and not much wind encouraging the growth. Even so, several nights I awoke in the camper to the smell of smoke and a burning in my eyes. Today, the air dried out and the wind arose; we’ll see what that means for the fire tomorrow. The webcam on the top of Mount Washburn is aimed toward the fire, although it’s rather difficult to discern much because of the glass reflections. Take a look over the next couple of days though; you may see the smoke if the fire expands.(www.yellowstone.net/webcamlive4.htm) The fire is still miles from me, but, accustomed as I might be to northeasters and hurricanes, fire is a whole new animal, and it’s unsettling, gives me a sense of some trepidation when I see a column of smoke arising or wake to the smell.
Early in the season, many of my co-workers and rangers, seasoned veterans of the park, expressed concern that the snow pack was melting too fast and that this would, despite a reasonable snowfall during the winter, be one of extreme fire hazard. I pretty much poohpoohed their concerns. After all, we still had a foot or two of snow on the ground, we had a frost each night, we were pretty well snowed in for Memorial Day. Still another reminder that I have to learn to be open-minded. Now, in July, we are experiencing the same heat wave that is causing deaths from Fresno to France. Admittedly it’s still tolerable at Lake, at 7800 feet. But my weekly trips to visit with Maybelline in Gardiner certainly were not productive in terms of our work together this week, with temperatures in the high 90s. And fires are burning in eastern Montana, and in the Livingston area due north of Gardiner as well as in the park. And the snow on peaks traditionally covered at this time of year is absent altogether or evidenced by daily dwindling patches in the high elevations. Even to a casual visitor like myself, there’s noticeably less snow in the Crazy Mountains, to the east of the G-M Ranch where the kids and I have spent some wonderful time. Currently, understand there’s a major fire in Galcier National Park. The North Rim of the Gand Canyon was evacuated earlier this season.
The consensus, from those willing to speak in the National Park Service, from scientists around the world, is that we are well past the tipping point, that we are in the throes of, dare I say it, an extinction event. We have put into place a set of conditions that are accelerating daily the extinction of species, the destruction of habitat, the unravelling of the functioning of ecosystems. The question before us today is not whether global warming is taking place, but rather whether we can apply our technological skills to slow down or reverse the process. And yet our national leadership is still asking whether global warming is taking place.
Certainly our own consumptive behaviors are a contributor to the process. The energy cost of having fresh gourmet lettuces throughout the year, the need for the newest appliances, the yearly or seasonal readornment through new wardrobes…the list goes on and on. Admittedly the extinction event is one in geologic time, if perhaps short term geologic time, and will not happen in my lifetime. But the changes have already occurred and in a dramatic fashion during my lifetime. I can only change the portion of the world in which I live, and that, through my own consumption habits. I’ve learned, during the last six months of living in a van, how little I really need, and how unimportant it is what I really want. I am interested to see whether my commitment today to living more simply, to consuming less, to reducing my footprint on the earth, will carry over when I’m living once again with indoor plumbing.
What I need to do now is return to documenting my time here in the park, which will end all too soon. This opportunity may not present itself again, and I need to take full advantage of my opportunities to observe and learn from what I observe. This morning, Bubba and I surprised a red foxwe’ve met before, and watched three mule deer, all without leaving the loop of the RV Park on which I live. The seasons are changing again, the bull bison have begun their rut, and I have to get out and watch it all unfold while I still can.
