Many trees and forests were built to live with fire and in many cases, fire is essential for a healthy ecosystem. Giant sequoias, for example, have cones that dry out during surface fires releasing their seeds so they can germinate at the ideal time to grow with less competition.

Ponderosa pines have a number of ways they have evolved to live with fire.

They have bark that when heated can split off from the tree protecting the trunk and reducing the spread of fire. 

They often lose lower branches, sometimes from smaller fires, reducing the likelihood of ladder fires that climb towards the crown.

The shade they cast and the acidic soil they favour helps reduce understory plants that could catch fire beneath the tree and help a fire to latch onto the main trunk.

They have deep roots that can remain intact after a fire allowing the tree to still gather water and nutrients even when surface roots are damaged.

Some policies of suppressing natural fires have changed the balance of many forest systems and helped promote some of the recent mega-fires.

More about the Fire ecology of ponderosa pines (pdf).

Also see: identify a douglas fir, time hierarchy

Ponderosa pine fire protections

In some forests where the trees grow tall such as in the US Pacific Northwest when a giant tree falls, it can clear a patch of forest letting in light and providing a new surface for seedlings to take root, away from the competition of the forest floor.

Sometimes the nurse log is so successful as a sort of creche for the young trees that they will grow along the full length of the fallen trunk. And when the original log decays away it leaves a remarkable, straight line of trees.

Nurse log

I love this term. From the Japanese shinrin-yoku, it means to soak in the atmosphere of a forest. And I think it’s not too far of an overstatement to say that a walk in Nature is about the closest to a miracle cure we have. There appear to be myriad benefits from simply spending time in Nature. As my sister put it, if it was a drug we’d be prescribing it.

Though we didn’t call it forest bathing at the time it’s definitely some of my happiest memories, like here, here, here, here, and here.

Sketchplanations tagged with forest