Skip Navigation

Button that takes you back to the home page. Button that takes you to the teacher pages. Button that takes you to the modules and activities page. Button that takes you to the glossary page. Button that takes you to the related links page. Button that takes you to the references page. Button that takes you to the Problem Based Learning model page. Image map of some Yellowstone Fires puzzle pieces.  Please have someone assist you with this.

Button that takes you to the Historical View page.
Button that takes you to the Fires of 1988 page.
Image that says Fuel and Fire Management.

Image of Earth System Science Education Alliance logo that links to the Earth System Science page.

Image of Earth's Spheres logo that links to the Earth's Spheres page.

For more information on wildland fire management, visit: Prescribed Fire in Yellowstone

Forest Fires and Forest Health

 

Wildland Fires in Yellowstone: Fuel & Fire Management
Wildland fires are often natural occurrences and can be beneficial. However, federal agencies do try to manage the amount of fuel loading that occurs in national parks like Yellowstone. This means they try to control the amount of burnable material (dry biomass) that builds up in the Park. They have also established fire management policies on how to deal with wildland fires that occur in the Park.

The program of controlling the accumulation of biomass in wildlands in order to reduce the amount of available fuel is called fuel management. The idea behind this program is to decrease the intensity of a fire when it does occur. By decreasing the fire's intensity, fuel management reduces the amount of damage caused by wildland fires as well as the costs of fighting the fires.

One fuel management technique that has been used by the National Park service is prescribed burning. Prescribed burning involves allowing fires that are started naturally or those that are intentionally set under controlled circumstances to continue burning until they are naturally extinguished. Fires are allowed to continue burning by "prescription" only if they occur in areas where they can be contained.

After the Yellowstone fires of 1988, the federal prescribed burning policy was temporarily halted. In 1992, the National Park Service initiated a revised wildland fire management plan. Now there are stricter conditions under which fires are allowed to burn. Today the Park Service has a prescribed fire program in which fires caused by people are always extinguished. However, some natural fires in the park are allowed to burn. Under the current policy, a prescribed natural fire must meet the following conditions in order to be allowed to burn:

  • the fire cannot cross the wilderness boundary
  • the fire cannot endanger people's lives
  • the fire cannot endanger private property
  • the weather conditions and forecast must be favorable (not too dry or too windy)
  • there have to be enough resources available to put out the fire if it starts to threaten people, property, or resource values.

Another fuel management technique is salvaging timber. In this practice, selected trees in the forest are sold to private operators who remove them from the Park. Other ways to reduce fuel loading include pruning or using chemical herbicides. However, these methods of fuel management are not often used because they are very expensive.

Historical View ..|.. Fires of 1988 ..|.. Fuel & Fire Management
Glossary
 
|  Related Links  |  References |  PBL Model 

 Home  |  Teacher Pages  |  Modules & Activities

Button that takes you back to the Yellowstone Fires main page.

HTML code by Chris Kreger
Maintained by ETE Team
Last updated April 28, 2005

Some images © 2004 www.clipart.com

Privacy Statement and Copyright © 1997-2004 by Wheeling Jesuit University/NASA-supported Classroom of the Future. All rights reserved.

Center for Educational Technologies, Circuit Board/Apple graphic logo, and COTF Classroom of the Future logo are registered trademarks of Wheeling Jesuit University.