controlled burn

Miforester said:
I'm not quite understanding that statement, is he indicating the soil is void of biological life when it hits 120. Can you please expand on this? We have wild fires that sweep across our landscape at temps much higher then 120. In many cases these sites are greening up within few days to weeks. As these sites rejuvenate themselves growth is good as dead vegetative material has been converted to a more usable state, potash, and we tend to see higher biotic activity from insect, because of higher temps on these sites. What I have seen it is not so much the temp of the burn but the residence time of the fire. By this I mean how slow or fast a fire moves over the landscape. A cool fire with a long residence time is much more damaging to the area, think short flame lengths and taking 5 minutes to burn 20ft. Not all fires are created equal...

We see increased biotic activity in our clear cuts as a result in higher ambient temps because of timber removal and regeneration. Grouse, turkey and woodcock all utilize these area for their broods to acquire their needed protein for the chicks. These clearcuts are prescribe to mimic fire on the landscape. I know first hand these stands feel like temps are higher then 120. Some of our jack pine clearcuts become hot enough in the summer to open their pine cones which typically open by fire, so these temps do exceed 120.

Sorry for the rambling, just taken aback by that statement for Mr Ward. Course been 25 plus years since my soil biology classes and my memory is as good as it used to be.
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I believe he is refering to the bacteria, fungi, the microbial life. I assume earthworms can go lower and there is microbial life at the lower levels of soil. Stay tuned we will hopefully gain some knowledge the next time 3 car does a burn.
 
Prairie Drifter said:
Might give this a read. http://talltimbers.org/news/news.php?news_id=688
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Here was the summary in the article. Interesting stuff Troy. Supports long term benefits are better than perceived short term "smoke". Supports more organic matter from burns than less.

"Results of the study support a growing body of literature suggesting that frequent burning results in organic matter accumulation that keeps a certain amount of carbon out of the atmosphere. Although carbon dioxide is released to the atmosphere through combustion of biomass during burns, about the same amount of carbon is fixed through photosynthesis by the rapidly re-growing plants during the following fire-free interval."
 
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