Prescribed Fire Threat to Mature Trees

[Thomasc19]

What's been everyone's experience doing prescribed fire in areas with mature maple, black cherry, aspen, beech, hemlock, and yellow/black birch? That's what my property mainly consists of and I'm worried if I attempt a controlled burn it will kill my mature trees since they're not "fire-adapted" like oaks and hickories.

Example of the property:

 

[Turkey Creek]

If it is just leaf litter like that you are burning I would guess the risk is relatively low. If there is particular trees that you are wanting to protect you can clear a small circle around the base of the tree. You can always burn a small test plot this year.

 

[bwoods11]

I thought Aspen was not very fire resistant, but I could be wrong. ?

 

[Natty Bumppo]

In that picture I am wondering what the management objective is in doing a controlled burn? It looks like there is very little sunlight hitting the ground and almost zero growth on the forest floor. A controlled burn will make the leaves go away. But I am uncertain you're going to get any benefit unless you drop some trees.

To answer your question....the mature trees will be fine. Sometimes in the mountains you'll get more leaves that accumulate on the uphill side of the tree. When that burns you may get a basal scar on the tree. But the tree will survive nonetheless.

 

[Thomasc19]

In that picture I am wondering what the management objective is in doing a controlled burn? It looks like there is very little sunlight hitting the ground and almost zero growth on the forest floor. A controlled burn will make the leaves go away. But I am uncertain you're going to get any benefit unless you drop some trees.

To answer your question....the mature trees will be fine. Sometimes in the mountains you'll get more leaves that accumulate on the uphill side of the tree. When that burns you may get a basal scar on the tree. But the tree will survive nonetheless.

Thank you natty, some units of my property I've been doing TSI which has left a lot of debris around/against standing trees. I'm thinking of doing prescribed burns and then doing TSI immediately following in the units i haven't touched yet and cleaning up around trees I want to save in units I have done TSI in

 

[c2ranch]

I'm not familiar with how those species respond to burning, but in nearly all cases we want to avoid having enough fuel under a tree to reach the canopy, or enough fuel around the base to burn through the outer layer of bark. Moving your fuel loads (cut down trees and brush from TSI) away from the base of trees you want to keep would be the order of the day. When we thin back our young loblollies, which are fairly sensitive under 7' or so, we take all of the cut down trees and use them elsewhere for erosion control or pile them up in a clearing far away from the young trees we want to keep. Especially look to avoid big giant piles of slash and such - spread those out thinner where there's more canopy coverage.