Dead wood

This is a dead tree, one of many Sealy and I see on our regular routes around town.

The past 8 years have been tough on trees, particularly the record setting drought years spanning 2013 to 2017. In addition, last year was a low rain year and since August we’ve seen extraordinarily hot weather. It’s not surprising we’re seeing more and more stressed trees, and many that are dead.

There’s no doubt we need to remove trees like these to reduce the fire risk.

Let’s look a little closer at this particular tree. I assume it’s on private land but it is next to the road and pathway, a long way from the house. It’s behind other vegetation and hard to see from anywhere other than the road. I could easily understand if the property owner isn’t even aware that it’s there. And it’s relatively small compared to other dead trees.

I bring up the particulars of this tree to highlight that it’s going to require a lot of thought and planning to fire harden our town. Dead trees are just one fire hazard and a little more complex when we dig into the issues. There are an increasing number of dead trees, they represent different levels of danger depending on their size and what else they are close to, they are on both private and public property, and sometimes property owners aren’t even aware they have dead trees and a responsibility to remove them. They can’t all be removed at once so how do we prioritize the work?

Dead trees are just one of many fire dangers. We need to develop a comprehensive plan to make our town fire resistant. It’s going to take time and require close collaboration with the council, town committees, staff, the LAHCFD, the water districts, the county.... But it’s really, really important and we need to get started.