Thinning a successful strategy for N.M. forest fire prevention

Lee Ross
Mountain View Telegraph

EDGEWOOD, N.M. — A thinning project in Edgewood may be an opportunity for the state Land Office to help heal some old wounds.

The 80-acre project is being done on forested land that skirts Los Cerritos Estates.

The town of Edgewood leases the land from the state Land Office, along with a large parcel beyond it, about 680 acres in all, called Section 32.

In the past, the town of Edgewood has tried to find a way through the subdivision to gain a permanent and easy access for recreation onto the area.

In 2004, around the time the town acquired the lease for Section 32, residents of Los Cerritos Estates expressed concern that the town would condemn one of their roads and take it over as an access road.

That may be a reason the area's homeowners association is looking at the current thinning project with caution. But they decided to move forward anyway.

"We're working in concert with the contractor and the state Land Office," Mike Rariden, a board member on the Los Cerritos Estates Area Homeowners Association, said in a phone interview Friday.

The association had a meeting to discuss the current thinning project on Jan. 3 and may allow access for thinning on the neighborhood's road.

"That's a private road in there," said Rariden. "We have to pay for the repairs."

He said the board agreed that the project could reduce a threat in their neighborhood.

"Everybody is in agreement that the fire potential is pretty great," said Rariden. "We're happy with this project."

The first phase of the project is a fuel break, designed to stop a fire before it hits the houses. Trees are thinned to 60 per acre in a strip 300 feet wide.

On Jan. 3, Jeremy Hanlon bumped his mud-splattered pickup, which runs on biodiesel, across the thinned area, which was almost completed at that time.

Hanlon owns the company that is doing the work, Forest Fitness LLC.

Hanlon's crew was hard at work with chainsaws and chippers, spraying piñon and juniper slivers across the ground.

"The woods as your office, it's hard to beat that," Hanlon said. "These people are going to be able to see a lot of wildlife once this project is completed."

As he drove across the thinned area, within 200 yards of the wood chipper, a buck with one antler came out of the woods, stood for a while, then left as the truck approached it.

In addition to the benefits of lower tree-density, the crowns of the trees are no longer touching, which reduces the fire hazard, said Hanlon, who was a firefighter for 13 years.

The forest, which still has a mix of old and young piñon and juniper trees, is closer to what it would normally look like, had natural wildfires been allowed to burn, Hanlon said, praising the job his crew had done.

"I just can't say enough about my crew," he said.

Most of the money for this part of the project, about $50,000, came from the state Forestry Division.

The appropriation for that money expired Dec. 31, 2007, so the state Land Office agreed to kick in money for the part of the project what wasn't finished by that time, according to Brian Henington of the state Land Office, who rode shotgun in Hanlon's truck.

Henington added that the thinned trees can defend themselves against bark beetles. That's because, with less trees fighting for limited resources, the existing trees are healthier and, therefore, more resistant, Henington said.