Final Environmental Impact Statement

Vestal Final Environmental Impact Statement Chapter 3
Condition Class and Fire Regime
Historically, fires were more frequent and less severe. Fire suppression activities have
trended the forest outside historic ranges. Currently, there are three general types of fire
regimes in the Black Hills; Frequent low-severity, Infrequent high severity, and Mixed
severity (USDA Forest Service 2005a). Fire regimes characterize the role fire plays in an
ecosystem. The Fire Regime Condition Class rating can be used to describe the degree of
departure from the historic fire regime (Hann et al. 2003).
The coarse scale national data characterizes the Black Hills as primarily fire regime
Condition Class 3, which denotes a high degree of departure from the historic fire regime.
There is a high relative risk of significantly altering or losing key components of the
ponderosa pine forest system. (USDA Forest Service 2005a) These conditions
significantly increase the probability of a surface fire transitioning to a crown fire with
increased burn severity and tree mortality. Evidence of past fires shows the potential for
large, high intensity surface fires, and, given the right conditions, stand-replacing fires.
Recent examples of past large fires include the Jasper, Elk Mountain II, Battle Creek,
Rico and Alabaugh.
Fire Risk
Risks are defined as those uses or human activities which have the potential to result in a
wildfire ignition. Fire history occurrence of both large and point fires were analyzed
using the project perimeter. The fire history data includes fires occurring from 1950 to
present. Of the fires identified, 128 are known lightning-caused, 18 equipment-caused, 15
campfire-caused, 3 smoking-caused, 38 debris burning-caused, 3 railroad-caused, 5
arson-caused, 14 children-caused and 67 miscellaneous. Both fire history occurrence data
as well as large fire history, those fires exceeding 20 acres, in and around the project area
are depicted. In addition, the percent of the project area impacted was analyzed. (Figure
8, Table 39)
Table 39. Fire History Occurrence and the Size of the Fires from 1950 to Present
Fire Size Class Fire Size (acres) Number of Fires
A 0 – ¼ 232
B ¼ to 9 50
C 10-99 3
D-G 100+ 0
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