It's Happening; After the Fire

[Announcer] "It's Happening," with Bill Smith [Bill] Forest fires happen in the tall timber country of the Northwest almost every year. Sometimes they're worse than others depending upon weather conditions. But what happens after a huge forest fire, one that covers, covers several thousand acres. That's the question we'd like to answer. And in order to do it let's look at the forest before a fire. Composed of the young trees in the foreground and then the tall trees. These are almost ready to harvest, beautiful standing trees. And they'll go into the timber industry and be used as one of our national resources to build our homes and other buildings throughout the United States. 2x4s and lumber and plywood. The forests are also a place for fun. Recreation, boating, picnics. And when a fire hits, we would have the impression that all is lost. Well, we lose an awful lot, of course, and we're making a lot of improvements in our efforts and techniques in controlling forest fires. But when one does happen, and gets away, we have a lot of desolation. Here's an

old stump, probably filled with pitch left over from an earlier logging operation, still burning several hours or days after a fire. Moving across the fire- blackened scene, timber has fallen over. Some of it is still smoldering and burning. It's burned into the understory, the brush, and leaves us thinking that after a huge forest fire we have nothing but utter desolation. Well it is desolate. There's no question about this. And it will take many years to replace it. But really everything isn't lost. If you look more closely, you'll find standing timber. There--these trees are killed, but they are still standing. Have they been damaged, can they be used for lumber? It's rugged country. It's difficult to get to. And perhaps no more easier after a fire than before it, because we need to move in rapidly if we're going to make use of this timber. A sawmill operator tells us about the timber from the huge forest fire [Operator] We were logging on

public land when the Oxbow fire broke out. And our logging crews, and some of our people here at Seneca Sawmill Company, went down and helped fight the fire. After the fire was over, because we're in the sawmill business, we looked at the wood that remained after the, after the fire. Our analysis was that this wood could be profitably manufactured. Keeping our own people working, and extending our own timber supply. The material we purchased out of the burn was manufactured here, helping sustain the employment of some 80 people that we hire here. [Bill] Now what was the condition of this material? What could you make out of it? [Operator] We made our normal products. We had some difficulty with the char in the wood, the chips that we made from this material I had to be carefully watched at some additional cost of doing business. But we

manufactured the same high grade wood product that we do out of green timber. [Bill] And here is the way the logging operation is conducted. The cry of 'timber!' or 'there she goes!' rings through the forests. The chainsaws attack these trees making the undercut and then the cut on the back side so that the skilled timber fallers can drop them down into the valley without breaking them and without damaging some of the other logs that have already been cut. Almost 25,000 acres were burned in this Oxbow fire, a few years ago in the western part of Oregon. Out of this came some 2 billion board feet of lumber. How much lumber is two billion board feet? Well if you would line up the log trucks, the ones like you will see in a few moments, they would reach from the West Coast of the United

States to Omaha, Nebraska. If you were to line up the logs, end after end, one after the other, they would reach from the West Coast of the United States clear to London. And most of this as Mr Howard, the sawmill operator, said is good timber and will make good lumber. [sound of tree falling] The logging methods are the same for burned timber as for green timber. The tower, where the donkey engine is located, with various cables and pulleys, is used to pull the logs from the valley, where the choker setters put these cables around the logs, up to the landing. Several logs at a time will be lifted from the valley.

Quite a number of logging contractors were at work in a short period of time in this huge burn. Roads had to be built so that they could get to the various stands of timber. And as they were logged, care was taken to keep from dragging the logs across the soil as much as possible. If they're suspended in the air in this fashion it prevents disturbing the forest soil. New trees will plant more easily and will grow more readily, and the soil will not erode and wash down the valleys as badly as if these logs were dragged across. So extra care was taken by the logging operators in the logging in this area. In about two years time practically all of these trees were cut and were put to good use. Here's some of the other equipment, conventional logging equipment, where the tower and

yarding machine is located on this landing. This is where the huge log trucks drive in, and are loaded with these large logs. Some of them running four, to five, and even six feet in diameter. The logging contractors worked at this job the year around, in snow of the winter and the heat of the summer and the rains in the spring and fall. They travel over specially built roads. Roads for the loggers themselves. A few miles away, from where this logging was taking place, wildlife still abounds in spite of the burn. In fact, after a forest fire, many times the elk and deer will find some of the types of plants growing that they like to graze. It's called browse, the young shrubs. And here's a herd of elk about 35 or 40, in an area, in part of the burn, and

adjacent to it. As this truck travels on down where the logs will be delivered to a sawmill, it goes through an area that was untouched by this fire, and a stream that still flows quite clear in spite of the fact that it originates in the burned over area. As quickly as possible, the forester's restock the land with shrubs and trees to prevent soil erosion. At a landing on a small coastal stream, the logs will be placed into the water, made up into a raft. Water transportation is one of the cheapest forms of transportation to take these logs to the sawmill and where streams are available they are used. The conservationists have worked out various systems of preventing damage to the streams by the logs. After these binders are removed from the truck, the entire load is hoisted, then, into the water. And the chokers uncouple automatically, and the logs rather gently roll out into the water.

Here's a tuffy little tugboat. A rugged little machine, built out of solid steel, has a powerful engine in it. The operator on it is very much like a cowboy rounding up cattle as he pushes and shoves and noses these logs away from the point where they're dropped into the water into the rafting area, where some rather skilled workers walk around with their calk boots on top of these logs and push them into the arrangement that they would like to have. And here's the tug boat. Starting out with the tow, it'll go about 25 or 30 miles downstream to the sawmill. Many different truckloads of logs are included in this raft. And you notice the scale of this tugboat operator as he negotiates with this long raft some of the rather narrow curves. Where will we get the young trees and the seeds to replant a burned over area? Because this must be done, and it must be done as quickly as possible. It's done in a variety of ways. Seeding with natural trees that remain,

helicopter seeding, and then the use of young trees from a nursery. This nursery is operated by the timber landowners themselves, some of the big timber companies. And they've gone together in an organization known as the Industrial Forestry Association. One of their jobs is to operate the nursery. The trees are lifted during the winter months by the tractor. And then the workers pull them individually and put them into packs. As they pull them out of this loose sandy loam soil, they shake all of the dirt loose from the roots. But the roots are kept moist. In order for a young tree to be transplanted, the roots must not dry out. So they're covered with a damp burlap as soon as each pack is made up. Also the trees are pulled during the damp season, which prevents their drying out. It's a mass production business. And tractors and trailers

and rather large loads containing several thousand trees are pulled each day and taken to the packing shed. Inside the packing shed again we see mass production, while these trees are sorted and packed for use in the field. These workers are sorting them according to size. The trees are about two years old at this point. Packers will then trim the roots so that they'll conveniently fit a package. They have more roots than are needed for transplanting. Peat moss is packed with the roots to keep them damp and moist. They're wrapped in a waterproof paper then placed in a waterproof bag. This bag can be refrigerated until it's delivered to the rather rugged men who work out in the

mountains and the hills, planting the young trees. Here the bag's opened up. They work during the winter months when the weather conditions are damp and there's less risk in having the trees die, or dry out. Each fills his hassock with these packs of 50 young trees each, and he carries two to three hundred of them, as they climb up the rugged hills. They take these mattocks along. This is their tree planting tool. They may be filling in some areas that didn't take properly after they were helicopter seeded. Or they may be planting a whole a whole area that wasn't suitable for seeding from the air. He walks by this charred old the stump, finds it a good place to plant a new tree where it'll grow up in the shade of the old stump. It's hard work, particularly climbing up and down the hill. Let's see how they work this: the mattock goes in, the tree goes in, taps it lightly, hits it firmly with his heel of his boot. And that young tree then has a good chance of survival.

In the burned over area, where a few old trees still remain standing, a forester goes through to inspect the results of the tree planting and seeding. He notices the undergrowth, the ?celauw?, and other shrubs that keep the soil from washing away. And here are some new trees, this one about two years old at this point. Growing quite well. He finds another little one that has grown from seed. It's only a year old but it seems to be healthy, reaches up to the top of his shoe. And on down to other trees showing various stages of growth. Well, this is a baby forest It's a vigorous thing, even though it seems to be rather, oh, small and baby like. But it'll grow and replace the trees that were killed by the fire. And we say killed, rather than burned, because we've learned how to salvage-log a lot of usable lumber, after a forest fire. [music plays] [Announcer] "It's Happening" is a Corvallis production of Oregon Educational Broadcasting.