PFT’s pioneering work to develop incentives and policies to restoring natural fire regimes to Western forests has been in place for decades. Over the past several years, we have been matching that with reinstating the practice of restoring fire. This year we embarked on an ambitious project reintroducing “good fire” at a large scale in commercially managed forests, enhancing forest resilience and ecological health while improving community safety. Our policy work spans building coalitions, supporting science-based advocacy, and developing successful policy initiatives. Now we are “walking the talk” by putting beneficial fire back on the landscapes we manage — demonstrating the practicality and feasibility of this paradigm shift in forest management. This year, we burned almost 900 acres of commercially managed forest at McCloud Soda Springs, also advancing the art, science, and practice of beneficial fire. This is the largest prescribed burns on private commercial forest in over two decades.

McCloud Soda Springs

A Landmark Burn PFT has conserved the McCloud Soda Springs Working Forest and also manages it on behalf of its owner, Schroll Timberlands. Bordering the town of McCloud in Northern California, this 1,350-acre ponderosa pine-mixed conifer forest has multiple wet meadows and springs. It had been significantly altered by years of industrial management and fire suppression, simplifying its rich, diverse ecosystem and reducing its fire and climate resilience. Our goal in returning fire to this forest, which would naturally have had a low-intensity burn for at least once a decade, is to reduce the risks of high intensity fire by restoring tree spacing and meadow extent, as well as enrich the soil and promote more natural species composition, including for key native oak species. With a $1.8 million grant from California’s Wildlife Conservation Board, we undertook a massive prescribed burn covering approximately 900 acres. The burn was meticulously planned to enhance the property’s fire resilience and habitat values. It has been planned for since the initial harvest was undertaken in 2018, and subsequent further noncommercial and biomass thinning. These steps reduced the risk of fire spreading out of control lines.

We are particularly proud of the community engagement in this project. Many McCloud residents observed the burn, interacted with our fire crews, and participated in discussions about the positive effects of prescribed fire. This community involvement underscores the importance of public education and engagement in advancing prescribed fire initiatives, as well as how indispensable a tool “good fire” can be in keeping our towns safe from catastrophic wildfire.

The success of the McCloud Soda Springs burn extends beyond its ecological benefits. We produced educational videos documenting the preparation, execution, and early results of the burn. These videos are serving as a valuable resource for other forest owners, managers, and foresters, inspiring them to safely incorporate prescribed burns into their management practices. The burn also attracted Our burn mitigates the risk national attention with coverage on CBS.