Prescribed Burning Operations Continue Today in Northern HD Mountains

Release Date: Sep 22, 2015

BAYFIELD – U.S. Forest Service fire crews plan to complete the Yellowjacket Prescribed Burn east of Bayfield today by aerially igniting 944 acres of National Forest lands in the Northern HD Mountains south of U.S. Highway 160, for a sum total of 2,539 acres treated with prescribed fire in the area this week. The earlier planned First Notch Prescribed Burn north of the highway has been postponed due to incoming weather conditions. 

 

Daytime smoke from the Yellowjacket Prescribed Burn is again expected to drift north and east into the Upper Piedra Drainage and  Southern Hinsdale County.  Nighttime smoke is again projected to settle into the Beaver Creek and Sauls Creek drainages.  The Forest Service thanks area residents for their patience with the resulting smoke.  Prescribed burning is designed to lower the risk of wildfire to public lands and adjacent communities and to improve wildlife habitat on public lands.

 

 

Prescribed fire smoke may affect your health. For more information, please go to:

https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/cdphe/wood-smoke-and-health.

                                                  

For information on prescribed burns, wildfires and fire restrictions on the San Juan National Forest, call 970 247-4874, visit the Forest Website at: http://www.fs.usda.gov/sanjuan/ , or follow us on Twitter at:  https://twitter.com/SanJuanNF

 

The San Juan National Forest manages 1.8 million acres of federal land in southwestern Colorado within Archuleta, Conejos, Dolores, Hinsdale, La Plata, Mineral, Montezuma, Rio Grande and San Juan counties.