Davidsonranch
Well-known member
My family and community recently went through the Berry Point fire here in SE Oregon. It reached over 100,000 acres and destroyed most everything in its path. All through high school and college I worked as a wildland firefighter, so I have some experience and first hand knowledge of what it takes to fight a fire. Well I'm here to tell you things have changed. No longer does the Forest Service "fight" a fire. They take a more stand back method and use a technique called "backburning". The idea is to get in front of the fire and burn everything in front of it so the fire runs out of fuel. When I fought fire, it was a last resort, serious tactic. Not any more. I bet 50% of the Berry Point fire total acres burned was backburn by the USFS.
In the aftermath of the fire the damage is incredible. My in laws land that has been in the family for over 100 years if torched. Not by the fire, but by the damn backburn by the USFS. The fire never even got close!!! They promised to tell us "if" they needed to do it we would be the first to know. Nope, they torched it, it got away from them and burned up our land. Our friends are now up to 30 head of cattle burned up or had to put them down as they were burned so bad. Also the wildlife was destroyed. Some elk, lots of deer (we personally had to shoot two fawns with their hoofs burned off).
So picture your cows (on Forest Service grazing allotments) trying to escape from the fire only to be met by another wall of flames from the USFS "backburn". They didn't care. We had friends literally riding horses through flames trying to push them out. But it's too late. And for some the long term ramificaitons are even worse. Their grazing allotments are gone. And USFS has policies about how long you have to wait after a fire to let cattle back in; and it's years. The fire expenditures was reaching 10 million dollars. They even sent a air tanker from Boise, ID to drop one load of fire retardent that reportedly cost $150,000 for one load. Yet the USFS could not send in a couple folks to help the ranchers get their cows out.
This tops it all. My in laws have already received letters from USFS stating that they need to start replanting trees as soon as possible. I wanted to write a letter saying, "Hell you are the ones that burned our land and killed everyone's cows - you replant it!"
I believe the government has amnesty and they cannot be sued. I know there are several ranchers looking into someone taking accountability for the backburns that in some areas served their purpose, but in others did nothting but cause death, destruction, and financial loss.
My friend posted some pics on his facebook page. Not sure if the links will get there.
In the aftermath of the fire the damage is incredible. My in laws land that has been in the family for over 100 years if torched. Not by the fire, but by the damn backburn by the USFS. The fire never even got close!!! They promised to tell us "if" they needed to do it we would be the first to know. Nope, they torched it, it got away from them and burned up our land. Our friends are now up to 30 head of cattle burned up or had to put them down as they were burned so bad. Also the wildlife was destroyed. Some elk, lots of deer (we personally had to shoot two fawns with their hoofs burned off).
So picture your cows (on Forest Service grazing allotments) trying to escape from the fire only to be met by another wall of flames from the USFS "backburn". They didn't care. We had friends literally riding horses through flames trying to push them out. But it's too late. And for some the long term ramificaitons are even worse. Their grazing allotments are gone. And USFS has policies about how long you have to wait after a fire to let cattle back in; and it's years. The fire expenditures was reaching 10 million dollars. They even sent a air tanker from Boise, ID to drop one load of fire retardent that reportedly cost $150,000 for one load. Yet the USFS could not send in a couple folks to help the ranchers get their cows out.
This tops it all. My in laws have already received letters from USFS stating that they need to start replanting trees as soon as possible. I wanted to write a letter saying, "Hell you are the ones that burned our land and killed everyone's cows - you replant it!"
I believe the government has amnesty and they cannot be sued. I know there are several ranchers looking into someone taking accountability for the backburns that in some areas served their purpose, but in others did nothting but cause death, destruction, and financial loss.
My friend posted some pics on his facebook page. Not sure if the links will get there.