Fire Program ...
(Prescribed burn on Maga Ta-Hohpi WPA, Courtsey USFWS)
An active part of the HWMD is our fire program which is a part of the Huron Fire Management District (HFMD). The HFMD is a little different from the HWMD in that it includes all the USFWS lands in southeast South Dakota. This includes Lake Andes National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) (near Lake Andes SD), Karl Mundt NWR (near Pickstown SD) and Madison WMD (near Madison SD) along with the two national fish hatcheries Gavins Point National Fish Hatchery (near Yankton SD) and D.C. Booth Historic National Fish Hatchery (in Spearfish SD).
In the HFMD, we average 27 prescribed burns totaling approximately 3,200 acres each year. In addition to district fire management, our fire personnel assist in fire management to other agencies locally and nationwide. In past few years our fire crews assisted other federal and state agencies in their Fire management duties in South Dakota, North Dakota, Colorado, Arizona, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Texas and Oklahoma. We additionally provided assistance with the relief efforts along the gulf coast.
For the fire staff of spring means the start of the prescribed fire season. Although this is the time of year when properly applied fire is the most affective in achieving our management goals, the actual process of conducting a prescribed fire actually starts long before any flames hit the ground.
The first step starts during the preceding fall, when we identify what units we plan to burn and what we hope to achieve. Typically the two main reasons we burn here at the HWMD are habitat maintenance and to reduce the amount of hazardous fuels. Usually the two reasons go hand in hand.
We conduct habitat maintenance burns for a number of reasons. One of the main reasons is to replicate the prairies natural burn cycle on our Waterfowl Production Areas (WPA's) and promote the growth of native grasses and shrubs. Here at the HFMD we try to follow a ten-year burn cycle meaning most of our WPA's should see fire at least once every ten years. Sometimes special management decisions require us to burn a WPA more or less often but ten years is the standard goal.
The objective of a habitat maintenance burn is to stress the non-native cool season grasses such as smooth brome right after they start the growth cycle. Stressing these plants early in the cycle gives native warm season grasses a better chance to become established and hopefully out-compete these non-native grasses. We also use habitat maintenance burns to help in the control of noxious weeds.
Safety is always the foremost consideration of the Fish and Wildlife Service whenever conducting a prescribed burn. We will not compromise personal or property safety in order to conduct a burn. "If we can't do it safely we won't do it".
Because of this safety concern, a burn plan is required for any prescribed fire. Basically a burn plan is a prescription of what it will take to conduct this burn in a safe manner and still accomplish our goal. Within this prescription numerous boundaries or trigger points are identified. Some of these trigger points are weather conditions such as relative humidity levels, wind speed and wind direction. Other portions of the plan include smoke management strategies in order to minimize the amount of smoke on roads or homes, number of personnel and type of equipment needed to accomplish the burn and contingency plans in the rare case an escape does occur.
A common concern we hear each year is the fear that we are reducing the pheasant population by burning pheasants and their nests. The reality is it is extremely rare that we actually burn over a pheasant. In most instances pheasants will fly long before they can be trapped in the flames. Burning over of a nest does occasionally occur, however in an attempt to minimize this we try to conduct our burns before pheasant nesting is at its peak. Studies indicate that most nesting birds will simply re-nest following a burn over.
Habitat benefits from a prescribed burn are numerous. Removal of built up thatch resulting in thicker stands of grasses and improved nesting cover is the most obvious result. Other benefits include stimulation of native species, reduction of fuels available to wildfires and in some cases reduction of noxious weeds.
Properly applied, fire is an extremely important management tool in our attempts to preserve and restore native ecosystem in our WPA's.
As the spring progresses due to weather and green up in the grass we stop our prescribed burning operations and start mechanical treatments of the habitat. We will begin removal of dead and over crowded shelter belt. We try and remove trees on our lands to bring the ecosystem back into the native prairie grass system, however we do not cut all of our shelter belts as wildlife of all types utilize our lands and trees are important and vital to there health.
As the summer progresses we transition into fire suppression on our lands and neighboring land to prevent damaging wildfires. This includes the rest of the nation as fire danger in the eastern part of South Dakota during the summer is generally low due to the growing crops that are present. So in the summer the fire staff personnel are on a national 24 hr call up list that might find us traveling to any part of the nation to assist in wildfire suppression. In the past we have even sent fire personnel from HFMD to Australia to assist in their fire fighting efforts.
If you have any questions regarding our fire management operations please give us a call at 605-352-5894.