Explore Pitchstone · Hub 04
Fire & Resilience.
Fire, fuels, herbivory and management in landscapes shaped by disturbance.
Begin reading ↓Photo: Joanne Francis / Unsplash
The governing idea
Fire reflects what grew, what grazed and what was left to burn.
Vegetation structure, accumulated fuel, drought, wind and past management shape what happens when a fire starts. The same landscape may need protection from severe fire in one condition and carefully planned disturbance in another.
Resilience is not the absence of change. It is the capacity to absorb disturbance, recover function and keep the living systems people and wildlife depend on.
Explore The Land is One System →Four ways into the subject
Read the landscape before the flame.
Fire behaves according to what the land is carrying. Each pathway follows one part of that relationship.
Fire Ecology
How different ecosystems respond to the timing, frequency and severity of fire.
Fire & Herbivory
How grazing animals influence vegetation, fuel amount and fuel continuity.
Fuels & Wildfire Risk
How vegetation structure, weather and preparedness affect risk before an emergency.
Prescribed Fire
How planned fire can be used cautiously under defined ecological and operational conditions.
Four ways into the subject
Read the landscape before the flame.
Fire behaves according to what the land is carrying. Each pathway follows one part of that relationship.
Fire Ecology
How different ecosystems respond to the timing, frequency and severity of fire.
Fire & Herbivory
How grazing animals influence vegetation, fuel amount and fuel continuity.
Fuels & Wildfire Risk
How vegetation structure, weather and preparedness affect risk before an emergency.
Prescribed Fire
How planned fire can be used cautiously under defined ecological and operational conditions.
Start with
the evidence.
Fire ecology, herbivory, fuels and the institutions that decide when land is treated—five pieces from the Pitchstone archive.
Sacaton, Cows and Fire
A grassland, the cattle that graze it and the fire that shapes it—read together rather than one at a time.
Read the article →When Native Grazers Disappear, The Land Burns
How the collapse of deer and wild horses turned small fires into megafires—and why livestock alone cannot fix it.
Read →A Plant That’s Everywhere Is Fueling a Growing Risk of Wildfire Disaster
Fuels: one widespread plant and the wildfire risk it carries.
Read →Fire-Protection Plans Hit Red Tape, Then the Flames Came
Institutions: what happens when preparation stalls in process.
Read →Questions still developing
What works depends on place, scale and conditions.
Every tool has limits and tradeoffs. Claims about any of them should be tested against local fuel conditions, weather, ecological objectives and observed results.
- Prescribed firePlanned burning under set conditions
- Targeted grazingAnimals used to change fuel
- Mechanical treatmentThinning, cutting and clearing
- SuppressionPutting fire out
Fire touches every part of the land.
Fire & Resilience is one of five connected hubs. The same questions run through grazing, water and wildlife.