Fire Management

Fires were once a common influence on plant life cycles and communities. Some ecosystems depend on fire for seed germination and the fertile ash left behind.

Fire is a natural part of wildlife habitat. Before humans intervened, fires started by lightening would rage through an area, cleansing it of encroaching vegetation, reducing the fuel load of dead leaves and grass from years before and helping aerate the soil by removing debris.

Due to fears and the need to protect property, humans have suppressed natural wildfires. Without fire, all of the fuels (dead trees and leaf litter) added up and have created large wildfire situations. The large wildfires threaten wildlife and humans much more so than smaller fires would have. So, to mimic nature's natural fire cycles, fire can be used as a management tool.

Much of Salt Plains was historically prairie. Prairie ecosystems depend on fire as important tool to keep them as prairie.

When mother nature historically started wildfires in a prairie, the fires helped to keep invasives, such as red cedar, from taking over the prairie. It helped to clear areas that some birds used as leks and control other woody vegetation.

Prairie grasses thrive with fire. Unlike trees, the growing portion of a grass is close to the ground.

The refuge conducts prescribed fires on the prairie to remove old grasses and new trees. The prairie grass remains healthy because its growing point is undisturbed; It can easily re-grow its stem and tillers.

Move your mouse over the grass below. See where the brackets are drawn - this is where the youngest portion of the grass is located - the growing point or meristem.

When fire moves across a prairie during the appropriate season, it burns the old tillers off, but the growing point close to the ground is not affected.

Young trees are removed and the prairie remains an open grassland.

Salt Plains has several areas of forests, woodlands and locust groves. These trees can benefit from fire as well. Tall cottonwoods are often the roosts of resting birds. Beneath them, smaller trees grow from the berries eaten by the birds.

Removing these smaller trees helps the larger trees to grow and the habitat to remain healthy and beneficial for wildlife.

The aftermath of a fire is as beneficial for wildlife as the new plants that will grow in the ash. After a prescribed burn, wildlife can be seen foraging among the ashes, looking for insects and grubs that were beneath the leaf litter that was burned.

Fire is used to encourage the growth of plants such as grasses and forbes. The objective is to provide a patch-work of trees, bushes and grass. The patch-work can be seen as you look over an area under regular prescribed burning. You will see trees, different grasses and forbes all intermingled in the landscape. Diverse plant species support diverse wildlife populations. These healthy habitats are home to many animals.

It is often difficult to run a "prescribed fire" on Salt Plains due to high winds. Many times, biologists must find other methods to promote the diversity of plants in an area. Fires on Salt Plains are most often held during the winter months. By spring, new plants will have grown and the land is ready to support wildlife migrating north.