Humans have long maintained a complex and dynamic relationship with
wildland fire. While native North Americans utilized fire for
hundreds of years to promote growth of certain plants, facilitate
hunting, and clear travel corridors (Williams 1994), during most of
the 20th century fire on U.S. public lands was viewed as dangerous
and destructive. For decades, Federal agencies have worked to
suppress and minimize wildland fire on public lands, including
wilderness and other similarly protected areas (Parsons and Landres
1998). To protect scenery and natural features, for example, early
National Park managers worked to save these areas from destruction
by fire (Parsons and Botti 1996). Yet ecological research gradually
revealed that fire plays a more complex role in ecosystems than we
previously believed (Christensen 1988). Although it is true that
fire changes landscapes, many of these changes help to maintain
mosaics of vegetation, recycle nutrients, and conserve biological
diversity (Kilgore 1986). Additionally, anthropological research
has shown that humans have not always had an adversarial
relationship with fire, and that in fact, fire played an important
role in the hunting and gathering systems of many Native American
tribes (Lewis 1985). In light of this understanding, fire
management on U.S. Federal lands has changed. Rather than attempt
to suppress all fires, managers now work to minimize the risks
associated with fire while allowing fire to play a more natural
role in maintaining ecological processes and communities (NPS and
others 1998). Permitting a natural role for fire is particularly
appropriate for wilderness and protected areas with the mandate to
maintain natural conditions; however, restoring fire to ecosystems
after decades of fire suppression poses many challenges (Parsons
2000). In many areas, the structure and composition of plant
communities has changed in response to fire suppression. In the
absence of fires, woody fuels tend to accumulate in forests, which
in turn can increase their susceptibility to intense fires (Arno
and others 2000). Additionally, due to population growth and
development, many wilderness areas and National Parks now border
homes or communities, increasing the risks associated with escaped
fires. Restoring fire to wilderness and protected areas requires
management that integrates ecological and social knowledge, taking
into account the effects of various management options on plant,
animal, and human communities. The literature collected here
represents a small subset of this vast literature, selected for its
relevance to the issue of wilderness fire restoration and
management. As a broad overview of the literature on wilderness
fire, this reading list does not offer sufficient information on
which to base fire management plans. Specific plans for restoring
and managing fire in wilderness will require site-specific
knowledge, because ecosystems are varied and complex. An
understanding of local plant communities, their effects on fire
behavior, and their responses to fire will be of central
importance, as will information on animal distributions, behavior
and habitat requirements, patterns of natural and human
disturbance, jurisdictional boundaries, social and recreational
values, and risks to life and property. Nonetheless, the structure
of this reading list, and the papers we have cited and annotated,
should provide readers with a conceptual framework for applying
wilderness fire research to management. Furthermore, the reading
list can help readers to identify the types of local and regional
knowledge needed to manage fire in wilderness in accordance with
the purposes set forth in the Wilderness Act and similar
legislation designed to protect the values of naturalness and
wildness on public lands.
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