Smoke from Canadian wildfires
is a regular feature these days
in Wisconsin.
According to current maps, there are
seven hundred active wildfires
in Canada, most of them
categorized as out of control.
What's the risk of wildfires or
forest fires in Wisconsin?
And could cuts in federal funding
of the U.S.
Forest Service affect forest
management in Wisconsin
We're joined now by James Barnier,
Forest Fire Protection Section Chief
for the Division of Forestry,
and thanks very much for being here.
Thank you. So I know that the
Wisconsin DNR also has these
fire management dashboards online.
How has this year compared
historically for wildfires
in Wisconsin?
This year was fairly unique.
It was one of our more uncommon
types of events.
We've had, as you might remember,
a drier than normal winter.
We saw a significant number of
fires in January and February, which
we traditionally don't see.
So those fires cause a
lot of work on
our staff to
be prepared, be ready, typically
when we're trying to get ready for
our typical spring season, which is
March, April, and May.
And so that really took a toll on
our staff. Overall from that
working those two
months earlier. Traditionally we see
snow fall during that time frame.
So what are conditions like right
now for fires in Wisconsin?
Well, to be honest, we're just
starting to get back into some
droughtier conditions.
We're starting to staff up again and
just prepare for fires for
the summer months.
When a fire breaks out,
what kind of fuels its spread?
Well, most of our fires are caused
by people, and typically in
the state of Wisconsin, most of our
fire are wind driven, usually with
low RH and higher temperatures,
but mostly with wind and low RHs is
what we see drives most of the
fires, and usually that light fuels,
that grassier type fuels that
would spread really fast,
and then once that gets ignited the
fire gets a lot bigger, there's
called ladder fuels, those ladder
fuels get into the tops
of the trees and then when you see
those really significant type of
crown fires.
So you have told us that
it is not likely that Wisconsin
would ever see fires like
those in Canada.
Why not?
Well, I wouldn't say we wouldn't see
types of fires of that magnitude
of 250,000 acres.
We probably wouldn't that size of
fires. But we do see a lot of
significant, what I would say
catastrophic for the state of
Wisconsin.
Anything between, you know, 3,000
to, you now, 15,000
acres, those types of fire are
common, you known, every
so often in the state of Wisconsin
and have significant impacts across
the state.
So you've been with the DNR
for 30 years.
When you get that call that there's
that kind of fire going, what goes
through your head?
Well, I think our preparedness of
our staff on the ground, just making
sure they have all the tools and
resources that they need, and my
role predominantly is to oversee,
quote unquote, the command center
down in Madison here, and to
ensure that they can get all the
resources they need.
And sometimes that's working with
our partners, whether it's
Minnesota, Michigan, Ontario,
Manitoba, to help us on
our fires.
Speaking of which, a number
of DNR firefighters have
been in Canada.
Tell me about that.
Yeah, just like I just suggested
that we use their resources, they're
asking for our resources now.
So we've sent up 20 people to both
Ontario and Manitoba.
And during that time frame, they're
actually fighting fires and
working within that organization on
their IMT's incident management
teams to help facilitate that.
So doing so, it is a significant
event.
How much forest land
does Wisconsin have and who's
responsible for its management,
fire prevention, and firefighting?
Just in general, there's
about 57% of the forest
lands is privately owned and
about another 10% industry owned and
the rest is government entities.
And so we provide, Wisconsin DNR
provides support with those
landowners through sound
forest management practices to
provide some management plans for
them or through
industry, working through industry
foresters and ensuring that we have
a good solid.
Healthy forests to help
limit those large-scale typefires.
So we know that state officials
have concern about federal cuts
to states from the
U.S. Forest Service.
And Wisconsin, I understand,
receives about $2 million of
those federal funds.
Governor Evers said that cutting
that would be devastating to
state operations and
cause, you know, lacking
capacity for wildfire preparedness
and suppression.
What role do the feds play
in wildlife or wildfire
management.
They provide us a lot of funding
sources. So yes, roughly a little
over $2 million to support
perspectives associated
with wildfire preparedness.
And where would that money go?
Well, we work heavily with our
partners. Local fire departments are
one of our key components within the
state of Wisconsin. And we provide
grants to those to help facilitate
responses to those fires.
Also, for our needs, for training
responsibilities, our tools, our
resources. And even some of our
funding of our positions.
We currently, through some of those
federal dollars,
we fund seven
FTE worth of positions.
So we'll see what happens with
that funding.
But James Barnier, thanks very much
for joining us.
To be a
firefighter in that kind of
realm is a lot.
Am I done then?
Okay.
Can you leave immediately?
That's what I wanted. Watch out.
You're...