The aftermath

Part of my assignment yesterday, since the Visitor’s Center was closed because of the burn, was to document photographically the before the burn, the burn, and after the burn. 

This was the entrance to the Dees Trail before the burn.  Last night, I posted pictures of the prescribed burn.

So, today I walked the Dees Trail to document the difference.  You can notice in this shot that the fire crew really knows how to do their stuff.  The trail through the woods, savannah, and along the bayou remained untouched; while everything to each side of the trail was toast.

Even the signs along the nature trail remained unscathed.  This plot of saw palmetto will soon rejuvenate itself.  The smallest signs with trail arrows along the way showed not one sign of fire.  A very professional burn in my estimation.

My post last night garnered several questions which I’ll address tonight.  The first was about the goal of this burn.  Was it to kill the vegetation or all living things?  The goal was to burn off the vegetative understory, and try to eliminate woody plant growth.  Since this is the last large tract of wet pine savannah in existence, fire is a necessity to accomplish this.  Ideally, a burn like this should happen every three years.  In nature, these burns would have occurred naturally mostly caused by lightening. 

As for the other life forms found here, most mammals have the opportunity to escape the blaze.  Birds fly away for a time, lizards climb the trees, but some insects don’t make it.  Crows and egrets often move in after a burn to take advantage of those roasted insects.  Because of the moist soil of the savannah, most of the carnivorous plants survive since their roots are not damaged.  Those plants indigenous to the wet pine savannah generally thrive after a burn.  I’m not sure if the Henslow’s sparrow is endangered or not, but it is certainly a species of concern.  That sparrow winters here on the refuge, and gravitates to recently burned areas.

Ultimately, the concern of this refuge is for the Mississippi sandhill cranes.  Without prescribed burning, the open wet pine savannah would become overgrown with understory, and the cranes would cease to exist.  Both the cranes and the wet pine savannahs are endangered.  Everything is so inter-related.  Did you know that the Mississippi sandhill crane is the rarest bird species on earth?  That’s what I’ve been told.  Extinction is forever, so I support the efforts of this refuge.

The flames move very quickly through the understory, but some of the old downed trees remain smoldering for several days.  All this ash really adds nutrients to this acidic soil.  Some readers asked about all the smoke that was involved.  I was able to avoid most of that by staying up wind, but there was a definite campfire smell to the area overnight until today’s winds dissipated that.

 

As for my neck, my treatments of ibuprofen, ice packs, and dark chocolate pecan clusters is slowly making inroads on my pain.  Can you guess what my favorite part of the treatment is?   

I also made another discovery today and learned something new.  Do you have any idea what these are?   I’ll chat about these interesting artifacts tomorrow because this post is more than long enough already.

 

Thanks for stopping by…. talk to you later,  Judy