
A Day on the Burn Crew
Fire and the Restoration of Michigan Landscapes
Long before the state of Michigan was made up of a patchwork of geometric farm fields, sprawling cities, meandering highways, and stretches of forest, the state was made up mostly of a dynamic mixture of three landscapes–prairie, oak savanna, and oak forest. Those habitats shifted over time and space, ebbing and flowing with the natural pulse of wildfire. Fires started by lightning–and by Native Americans–burned for days at a time, traveled for miles across the landscape, and extinguished only when interrupted by a lake, river, or drenching rain.
Areas that burned every year or two became grassland. When fires stopped for awhile, those grasslands shifted into savanna. If they stopped for long enough, they eventually turned into forest. Then fires would sweep through again, clearing out trees, refreshing soil nutrients, and restoring more open conditions. Played out hundreds of times over thousands of years, this cycle shaped the richly diverse landscape of the American Midwest.
Development, fragmentation, and a cultural mistrust of fire have disrupted natural cycles of regeneration in our once-wild landscapes. Remove fire from the land and the habitat goes with it. The prairies, savannas, and oak forests of Michigan’s past have largely been destroyed, and those left are tattered remnants grown over in a tangle of weeds.
That’s why every year about this time, the Land Conservancy and other conservation groups across Michigan intentionally set fire to the ground. Prescribed burning, it’s called, and the name is no accident. Just as a doctor prescribes medicine for a sick patient, ecologists prescribe fire to heal ailing ecosystems.
A Day on the Burn Crew
(click through the pictures to follow along with a prescribed burn)
A Landscape Returns
For all its drama, prescribed burning is really just another tool we use to mimic natural processes in pursuit of a richer, more biodiverse landscape. We’ll return to this site in the coming weeks, months, and years to measure the response of the ecosystem to the fire.
In a few weeks, this blackened ground will be a carpet of the deepest green. Come August, a jungle of prairie grass will tower overhead. New oaks will sprout where they were once shaded out. My daughter will run through these woods in search of snakes and flowers. Swallows and waxwings will sweep up insects from the fields, bringing food home for their young. Sandhill cranes will circle above, watching over the age-old rhythms of the land.
Paul Mayer
awesome piece, a great view into a day on the fire line.