“A total of 16 large fires are burning 1,010,720 acres throughout the country. The majority of the fire activity remains in the West.” This statement was part of the daily report on the National Interagency Fire Center home page on September 14. Does the number of acres seem shockingly high to you? Can you fathom an area that large, or larger, being fire damaged in the United States each year? Statistics on the page from the last five years indicate this number of burned acres is not unusual. What are the causes? What are the economic and ecological consequences?

On September 17, ABC News reported a 15,433-acre fire in the San Bernardino National Forest in southern California was under control, allowing some of the over 1,500 residents who had evacuated to return to their homes. Forest fires begin either naturally with a lightning strike or perhaps more often by an unnatural cause such as a campfire gone out of control or a tossed cigarette butt in a highly parched, fire-ready, wooded area. High winds and seasonal drought contribute to a fire’s rapid spread and to the difficulty in containing or controlling it.

The economic impacts are felt by home and business owners and by municipal and federal agencies. Homes and businesses can be affected directly by fire, smoke, and water damage, or indirectly due to evacuation for periods of one to several days. Five Famous Fires reports on the causes and magnitude of these large fires, some of which are in recent memory. A source for economic impacts from an agency perspective is the USDA Forest Service web page titled Fire and Aviation Management, which links to F&AM Fiscal Year 2006 in Review and

2007 Independent Panel Large Wildfire Cost Review Recommendations. Yet another economic area impacted by fire is travel and leisure. The Los Angeles Times runs a regular feature in its travel section reporting on fires and their potential impact on travelers, including the San Bernardino fire.

The ABC News story states, “The fire, which remained under investigation, burned several outbuildings at a campground. About 1,080 firefighters were aided by 12 fixed-wing aircraft, 27 hand crews and 15 bulldozers.” This raises awareness regarding the human power and technology used in forest fire management. Fire Science, another page from the USDA Forest Service, provides excellent information for teachers, touching on the human and technological aspects of fire management.

Of course, each fire has ecological impact too. Is it best to put out fires as soon as possible after they start? That may save trees and habitat for tree-dwelling organisms, but what about those plant species that depend on fire for germination? If the fire is not allowed to burn, how is the forest floor impacted as debris accumulates? How much decomposition, the normal manner in which forest floor debris is removed, is occurring in areas of drought? These are the kinds of questions forest managers consider when developing fire management plans. These are also the kinds of questions your students can consider because the questions align with the following National Science Education Standards:

Life Science Content Standard C:

Regulation and Behavior

All organisms must be able to obtain and use resources, grow, reproduce, and maintain stable internal conditions while living in a constantly changing external environment.

Behavior is one kind of response an organism can make to an internal or environmental stimulus.

An organism’s behavior evolves through adaptation to its environment. How a species moves, obtains food, reproduces, and responds to danger are based in the species’ evolutionary history.

Populations and Ecosystems

Populations of organisms can be categorized by the function they serve in an ecosystem. Plants and some micro-organisms are producers–they make their own food. All animals, including humans, are consumers, which obtain food by eating other organisms. Decomposers, primarily bacteria and fungi, are consumers that use waste materials and dead organisms for food. Food webs identify the relationships among producers, consumers, and decomposers in an ecosystem.

The number of organisms an ecosystem can support depends on the resources available and abiotic factors, such as quantity of light and water, range of temperatures, and soil composition. Given adequate biotic and abiotic resources and no disease or predators, populations (including humans) increase at rapid rates. Lack of resources and other factors, such as predation and climate, limit the growth of populations in specific niches in the ecosystem.

Science in Personal and Social Perspectives Content Standard F:

Natural Hazards

Internal and external processes of the earth system cause natural hazards, events that change or destroy human and wildlife habitats, damage property, and harm or kill humans. Natural hazards include earthquakes, landslides, wildfires, volcanic eruptions, floods, storms, and even possible impacts of asteroids.[See Content Standard D (grades 5-8)]

Human activities also can induce hazards through resource acquisition, urban growth, land-use decisions, and waste disposal. Such activities can accelerate many natural changes.

Natural hazards can present personal and societal challenges because misidentifying the change or incorrectly estimating the rate and scale of change may result in either too little attention and significant human costs or too much cost for unneeded preventive measures.

Risks and Benefits

Risk analysis considers the type of hazard and estimates the number of people that might be exposed and the number likely to suffer consequences. The results are used to determine the options for reducing or eliminating risks.

Students should understand the risks associated with natural hazards (fires, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions), with chemical hazards (pollutants in air, water, soil, and food), with biological hazards (pollen, viruses, bacterial, and parasites), social hazards (occupational safety and transportation), and with personal hazards (smoking, dieting, and drinking).

Individuals can use a systematic approach to thinking critically about risks and benefits. Examples include applying probability estimates to risks and comparing them to estimated personal and social benefits.

Important personal and social decisions are made based on perceptions of benefits and risks.

Here are some additional resources that are part of the NSDL Middle School Portal collection to facilitate your instruction regarding forest fires: Fire!! and On Fire.

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Let us know what you think and tell us how we can serve you better. We want your feedback on all of the NSDL Middle School Portal science publications. Email us at msp@msteacher.org.