By Martin E. Comas
Orlando Sentinel
Copyright 2007 Sentinel Communications Co.
SEMINOLE STATE FOREST, Fla. — Deep in the woods, the Gyro Trac mulcher resembles a mechanical beast. It rocks back and forth as it chews up oak trees, sand pines, palmettos and anything else in its way, leaving behind a clear path of soft mulch as wide as a truck.
Gyro Tracs are not pretty machines, but they’re fast and effective tools that enable state forestry workers to clear out dense brush that provides fuel for fires.
And with Lake County experiencing a drought, state forestry officials must use everything they have to prevent fires. So far this year, Lake has received a little more than 6 inches of rain, well below the normal of about 12 inches, according to the National Weather Service in Melbourne.
“The fire threat came earlier this year,” said Don Ruths, a wildlife mitigation specialist for the Withlacoochee Forestry Center of the state Division of Forestry.
“We had a very dry winter. And that dry winter and the lack of rainfall in the spring has turned everything into . . . a tinderbox.”
Recent rainfalls, including last weekend’s heavy but brief thunderstorms, have done little to improve the conditions in Lake. It would take several rainy days to make up the rainfall shortage, and that’s not coming any time soon, according to the National Weather Service.
This week, a group of forestry workers used the Gyro Trac and other mulching machines to create a 100-foot-wide perimeter of soft mulch around a 111-acre tract near dozens of homes in the Royal Trails community.
Workers plan to clear perimeters around 50-acre and a 24-acre tracts nearby as well. The work -- expected to be completed in about two weeks -- is part of a fire-mitigation project off State Road 44 near Seminole State Forest.
Forestry officials call the perimeters “a defensible space” because they quickly slow a fast-spreading fire. The perimeters also allow trucks and firefighters to get into an area quickly to battle a blaze.
“All it takes is for lightning to hit a tree here, and boom, you’ve got a big wildfire near hundreds of homes,” said Pat Gurnee, a forestry official who is overseeing the mitigation project in northeast Lake County. “This is going to help lessen that threat.”
Since Jan. 1, firefighters with the state Division of Forestry have battled 41 fires that burned 681 acres in Lake County. Statewide, there have been 1,525 fires, burning about 83,000 acres.
“That’s on the high side,” said Raymond Lovett, Lake supervisor for the state Division of Forestry.
Lake’s dry and windy conditions have created a bigger threat for wildfires this spring, Lovett said.
That worries state fire officials, who remember the summer of 1998 when 300 homes and businesses burned because of wildfires.
“Our [current] conditions are very similar to 1998,” Ruths said.
Using the Gyro Trac machine to establish a perimeter is just one fire-prevention tool. In the fall, state forestry officials will return to northeast Lake County to set controlled burns.
“The whole purpose of the perimeters is to prevent the fire -- whether it’s from a controlled burn or a natural burn -- [from] spreading across the ground to neighboring homes,” Ruths said.
Weather experts are not forecasting any relief. Within the next seven days, “we’re not looking for any significant rainfall for Lake County; nothing that would be a good dent in the [rainfall] deficit,” said Peggy Glitto, a National Weather Service meteorologist.
That’s why people should be extra careful, Ruths said. Even the spark from a lawn mower, all-terrain vehicle or lit cigarette could spark a fire.
“The biggest thing is to use common sense,” Ruths said.