Growing up on the hills in Kathmandu showed me breathtaking scenery that I thought existed only in books. Nine thousand feet above the sea level was my room in the Shivapuri hills, where I would often lookout to see the majestic beauty of the hills that surrounded my room. The bright shades of blue and clouds that ruffled in ripples would brighten up the entire landscape until the day of its arrival. The infernal blaze would transform the beauties of the woods into hot ribbons of light, and by the time the first morning light hit the smog, the forest would have disappeared.

A few weeks after studying the Adirondack mountains, I learned how the fires, that I had seen turn landscapes into ashes, could benefit the same landscape. It turns out that farmers, across centuries, believed that ashes from burnt trees increase soil nutrients, which would increase their yield. This belief was the building foundation of an agricultural practice known as Slash-and-Burn.

Although considered primitive, Slash and Burn still prevail in subsistence farming to grow a range of crops over a long period. In regions with declining forest coverages, like the Adirondack in the past, practicing Slash-and-Burn had many repercussions because setting out fires in parcels of land would light up entire forests through the dried slash left over from logging operations.

Controlling the magnitude and intensity of a forest fire is highly challenging. Even with slight carelessness, it is only a matter of a few minutes until habitats for hundreds of plants and animals will vanish. During summer, when the rain is the heaviest in the Adirondack region, there would be no longer be trees to canopy the soil or hold the ground firmly with its roots, which would cause soil erosion and landslides. Moreover, turning woods into ashes comes at a high cost of carbon dioxide, increasing greenhouse gas emissions.

The Adirondack mountains can be said to be a mountain shaped by fires. It has a long history of disastrous fires, including the fires around Lake Placid in 1903 and the Long Lake West fire in 1908 (“Forest Succession in the Adirondacks”, n.d.). Such fires initiate succession- the change in either species composition or vegetation architecture through time (Davis, 2019). Much of the Adirondack forest that we see today is a result of succession. When fire removes canopy, shrubs, grasses like prairies can thrive from receiving adequate sunlight and nutrients from the ashes. Some animals, such as deers, require these areas for living. Similarly, woodpeckers, sparrows, rattlesnakes, and other animals also benefit from the early phase after burning the woodlands (National Geographic, 2021). Besides providing the nutrients to the soil, fires would also get rid of invasive species such as ticks, which will give the wildlife a new, more suitable environment to grow.

Similar to planned forest fires, slash-and-burn is one of the most controversial techniques of agriculture. Many conservationists are against slash-and-burn because it has consistently led to forest fires over the years. Despite having some benefits to ecological systems, no forest burnt through slash and burn can recover back to its original state within a human’s lifetime. Slash and Burn agriculture could have long-term benefits, but today’s evidence shows that the raging forest fires are not helping the planet’s biodiversity.

Citations:

Davis, Ben. “What Is Plant Succession?” MVOrganizing, 19 Apr. 2019, https://www.mvorganizing.org/what-is-plant-succession/.

“Forest Succession in the Adirondacks.” Adirondack Forest Succession, shorturl.at/bfuE7.

“How Wild Animals Cope with Wildfires.” Environment, National Geographic, 4 May 2021, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/150914-animals-wildlife-wildfires-nation-california-science.