If you’ve been watching the news or hearing the increased buzz about wildfire in the last few years, you might be surprised to hear that there is actually less fire across much of the Western U.S. today than there was 250 years ago. However, attention is warranted because we are seeing a different kind of fire on the landscape today, a much more threatening kind.

Increasingly frequent catastrophic wildfires have been destroying large swaths of forest at an alarming rate, releasing carbon, destroying habitat, degrading water quality, and threatening communities with flames and smoke. Warmer temperatures and drier conditions of a changing climate contribute to this trend around the world, but in many regions including the Western U.S., misguided or overzealous forest and fire management over the last 150 years has contributed to the increase of catastrophic wildfire.

Before European-American settlement in the U.S. many forests experienced frequent fire, sparked by natural lightning or intentionally started by Indigenous Peoples for a variety of management and cultural purposes. Frequent, lower intensity fires cleared out competitive vegetation and aided trees and plants that relied on the presence of fire for reproduction. Landscapes were more diverse and resilient, in part due to the presence of wildfire.

As modern society became less tolerant of fire, these previously fire-adapted and resilient forest ecosystems began to crumble. Between the exclusion of Indigenous burning, suppression of natural ignitions, increased development, and emphasis on timber production, forests and fire regimes changed. Landscapes soon had younger, denser, and more homogenous forests. Fire suppression contributed to a ‘fire deficit,’ or the lack of otherwise natural fire, allowing for the dangerous buildup of fuel. Because of this, many forests today are vulnerable to widespread disturbances, such as disease, pests, and catastrophic wildfire.

Imagine you are building a campfire. If you have only a few larger logs and a lighter, you likely aren’t going to have much luck. However, if you have enough small twigs and medium branches clustered together, you will likely be able to grow your fire hot enough to grow and spread between the fuel. Similar dynamics can exist at a larger scale in fire-prone dry conifer forest ecosystems. Dense and homogenous fuel can allow fires to grow in size, intensity, and momentum and spread to the canopy of larger trees, which can cause widespread tree mortality.

There is a growing social awareness and acceptance that removing fire from fire-adapted ecosystems is an unsustainable approach, prompting a resurgence in recognizing fire as a crucial tool for ecosystem management. Many forest ecosystems need the revitalization of frequent, lower intensity fire that clears excess fuel and promotes resilient growth and biodiversity. This fire, termed ‘beneficial fire’, includes prescribed fire, cultural fire, and wildfires managed to burn safely.

However, many forests are out of balance after decades of mismanagement and these forests may need intervention before the reintroduction of beneficial fire. Ecological forest thinning is a form of fuel management that includes removing overly dense vegetation in a forest stand, which helps reset forest conditions, decreasing competition, increasing ecosystem heterogeneity, allows trees to grow larger, and reduces fire severity.

Finally, under certain weather and climate conditions, particularly, hot temperatures, dry periods, and windy days, fire may pose immense risk for growing out of control, and advanced firefighting is needed to stamp out some ignitions. On top of these forest and fire management techniques, community planning, mitigation, and preparedness is crucial for protecting lives, health, and infrastructure.