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Fire, Chaparral, And Survival In Southern California

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Finally a book on California wildfires that tells it like it is. Great natural history stuff too. Maybe now the public will wake up. Here's a review from the San Diego Union. It's accurate.

A biologist challenges common wisdom in 'Fire, Chaparral, and Survival in Southern California'

Reviewed by Terry Rodgers
February 6, 2005
San Diego Union-Tribune

Biologist and fire ecologist Richard W. Halsey sees ample evidence that Southern Californians simply don't get it.

Surrounded by a highly flammable chaparral landscape, we insist on building housing in inappropriate locations that are impossible to defend against wildfires. When the inevitable happens, we expect firefighters to accomplish the impossible by saving every structure, no matter how stupidly constructed. In the fire's aftermath, there's a clamor for more equipment, more choppers, more air tankers.

The public believes chaparral wildfires whipped up by Santa Ana winds can be easily subdued by a bigger, better-equipped army of firefighters. Using tragedy to push a political agenda, some try to blame the fires' destruction on the chaparral itself and those who favor open space conservation.

In "Fire, Chaparral, and Survival in Southern California," Halsey directly challenges the common wisdom that has fostered the pattern of tail-chasing after every wildfire disaster.

This is an interesting and important book that could dispel the public's misperceptions and improve public policy to minimize death and destruction from wildfires. Halsey forces the reader to rethink how mankind should live in Southern California's estimated 8.6 million acres of chaparral. He makes the case that much can be done through better land-use planning, improved building codes and a renewed vigilance on the part of homeowners.

"Past fire suppression practices or environmental regulations limiting vegetation treatments in wild spaces cannot be blamed for the wildfires we see today," he writes. "We must recognize fire will always be part of the California experience, with or without chaparral."

The initial chapters read like a chaparral-habitat field guide, before the book switches abruptly to Halsey's intriguing treatise on wildfire management, including lessons learned from the catastrophic wildfires of 2003.

The early chapters are worthwhile for amateur naturalists or natural history guides seeking a comprehensive understanding of chaparral ecology. Like the Golden State's once-robust population of grizzly bears, native chaparral and its cousin habitat, coastal sage scrub, are being systematically eliminated. For too long, the beauty and utility of the chaparral have been underappreciated. These plant communities are crucial to a healthy watershed that deters erosion and provide habitat for wildlife.

While it's true that periodic fires are healthy for chaparral, humans have increased the frequency of wildfires. Such overburning allows non-native grasses and other plants to take over.

"Considering development, increased fire frequency and the possibility of continued drought conditions, the future (of chaparral) looks extremely difficult," Halsey writes.

Much of the book is a how-to manual for homeowners who wish to create a reasonable defense against wildfire. Halsey argues that, rather than rely on firefighters to come to their rescue, homeowners need to be more savvy about how they prepare for the fires. They can create "survivable spaces" with intelligent (not clear-cut) brush clearing along with on-site measures such as misters under vulnerable wooden eaves.

The author supports his theories with a collection of interviews and anecdotes of residents and firefighters who have first-hand experience battling wildfires.

"What had become clear after the 2003 firestorm is that people had become so unfamiliar with the environment in which they lived and so dependent on outside assistance that they had lost control of their own lives," he writes. "They had neglected to prepare for the inevitable."

This book makes me believe in the power of nature. Richard Halsey has a warm, analytical style that pulls you into the world of the chaparral and its rich ecosystem. He is a master photographer and has insights that will educate individuals and families alike. I loved the stories and new education about the 2007 fires in this second edition. This is a book you will want to share with anyone who loves the outdoors or who has been touched by wildfire. I highly recommend it.

This book is a must read for everyone in the southwestern U.S. and northern Baja. Very factual information about fire and fire country. Dispels some myths. Offers lots of practical advice. It is a mystery to me how myths prevail and solid books such as this one sometimes get lost. If you live in fire country, get this book -- and read it!

This book is an absolute necessity for anyone living in Southern California, regardless of educational background and training or line of work. This book is vital to our survival in a region that historically burns, and burns on a large scale. It is, at once, an educational primer on local vegetation; a challenge to the long-standing and widespread myths and misconceptions about this vegetation; an overview of local fire behavior and its role in the local ecosystems; an examination of humankind's haphazard and precarious relationship with such fire; and a call to change that role by re-evaluating the way we view the land and ecosystems that are Southern California, and how we choose to live in it.

The first portion of the book defines, describes and discusses chaparral communities, stands of various types of vegetation that thrive throughout California and parts of Mexico. For the non-biologically or non-botanically inclined, DO NOT let this dissuade you. Not only does it help the reader to understand material in the subsequent chapters, but it also helps to open eyes to the remarkable natural beauty and wonder of Southern Californian ecosystems, beauty that thrives around us each and every day, but that most of us know little or nothing about, and thus cannot recognize. Following the crash course in botanical ecology are some wonderful accounts from a wide variety of contributors, including fire ecologists, veteran wildland firefighters, and survivors of some of Southern California's most catastrophic and devastating firestorms. Readers are sure to come away with a newfound appreciation for chaparral and its inherent beauty, as well as a greater understanding of the dangers humanity creates and then places itself in through our gross ignorance of the land and how we affect it.

Author Richard W. Halsey is a biologist/ecologist by passion, teacher by trade, and recently a wildland firefighter as well. He is the director of the California Chaparral Institute ([...]), a non-profit organization dedicated to education and the conservation of California chaparral, and teaches throughout Southern California. His book, "Fire, Chaparral, and Survival in Southern California" is recently published in a second edition; released in 2008, it includes discussions on the 2007 Firestorms that swept through San Diego, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, Santa Barbara, Ventura, and Los Angeles Counties, and Baja California in Mexico.

As a 13-year resident of Southern California, a 2-time evacuee of the 2003 and 2007 Firestorms, and a volunteer firefighter, I have been recommending this book to friends, family, and co-workers alike. Educational and eye-opening on a variety of levels, it even challenged some of the schooling I had learned on the job and in academy. For example, chaparral does not "need" to burn periodically to survive - a misconception commonly taught in wildland training. Quite to the contrary, too-frequent burning will destroy the chaparral entirely, leaving the countryside vulnerable to non-native, weedy invasions, and inviting yet more frequent, faster and hotter wildland fires. I recommend this book not only to general residents and property owners, but to wildland firefighters as well. With as much time as we spend studying building construction, compartment fire behavior, structural collapse, and other aspects of structural firefighting, it makes equally as much sense to put the same amount of time and emphasis on studying the nature of the natural habitats we go into to fight wildland fires.

The bottom line: If you live in Southern California, or fight fire there, BUY THIS BOOK AND READ IT.

This is a great resource for those living in chaparral areas. As a biologist I find the book particularly fascinating as it includes photos of common plants, chaparral communities (pre/post fire). I highly recommend picking this up to learn more about this interesting plant community and our human relationship to this valuable biological resource.