Management
Prescribed (RX) Fire
Today, we know that fire is essential to the health of our forest. Since conditions in many areas are conducive to large, severe wildland fires, and because so many people now live in or near forests, we need fires to burn in a more controlled way than is usually possible when they are caused by naturally occurring events such as lightning strikes.
The National Fire Plan
While the Forest Service has been managing wildland fire on National Forests and Grasslands for more than 100 years, the Forest Service doesn’t – and can’t – do it alone. Instead, the agency works closely with other federal, tribal, state, and local partners.
The US Department of Agriculture and the Department of Interior developed an interagency strategy, known as the "National Fire Plan," to respond to severe wildfires, reduce their impacts on rural communities, and assure sufficient firefighting capacity in the future.
Reducing hazardous fuels, using prescribed fire and other tools, is one of the key components of the National Fire Plan. The U.S. Congress has increased funding to the Forest Service to reduce hazardous fuels on federal lands, with emphasis on forests surrounding communities to decease risk to people and property.
Prescribed fire is a planned fire used to meet management objectives.
- Reduces hazardous fuels, protecting human communities from extreme fires.
- Minimizes the spread of pest insects and disease.
- Removes unwanted species that threaten species native to an ecosystem.
- Provides forage for game.
- Improves habitat for threatened and endangered species.
- Recycles nutrients back to the soil; and
- Promotes the growth of trees, wildflowers and other plants.
More prescribed fires mean fewer extreme wildfires.
Huron-Manistee National Forest Prescribed Fire Program
Human safety is always the first consideration whether fighting fires or using fire to restore a natural process.
The HMNF uses a combination of mechanical treatment to remove fuel, burning of piled limbs or branches, and area burning (called underburning). While such efforts are labor intensive, they are very effective in reducing the decadal fuel buildup while reducing the risk of flame damage to both vegetation and surrounding communities.
In order to restore fire to its natural role in the forest, the HMNF ignites prescribed fires in the spring and fall when conditions allow for slow, low intensity burning. By igniting prescribed fires, we can maximize the chance that they will burn with acceptable effects.
Specialists write burn plans for prescribed fires. Burn plans identify – or prescribe – the best conditions under which trees and other plants will burn to get the best results safely. Burn plans consider temperature, humidity, wind, moisture of the vegetation, and conditions for the dispersal of smoke. Prescribed fire specialists compare conditions on the ground to those outlined in burn plans before deciding whether to burn on a given day.
When burns occur, an alert will be posted the day of the burn on social media to check Inciweb notifying the public of RX Burns on the forest where residents and visitors may smell or see smoke or encounter emergency personnel and heavy equipment.
Interagency Fire Partnerships
The HMNF is a member of the Michigan Prescribed Fire Council. The Michigan Prescribed Fire Council was formed to bring together practitioners, guides, and students of prescribed fire to provide a network through which information could be disseminated, partnerships could form, and knowledge shared.
For more information on prescribed fire in Michigan go to The Michigan Prescribed Fire Council.