Fires Turn Up Heat On a Key Advocate Of California Shrubs

Wall Street Journal ^ | October 25, 2007 | Peter Sanders

[CutePuppy]

As wildfires raged in Southern California this week, Richard Halsey's embrace of the local shrubland turned prickly.

The founding director of the California Chaparral Institute, Mr. Halsey has spent four years defending the existence of chaparral, the term given to the wide varieties of shrubby plants, trees and bushes that dot the region's hilly landscape.

[CutePuppy]

"The problem is not the chaparral," he said this week. "The problem is people and the way they decide to place houses." He adds: "When you put a flammable structure in a flammable corridor it's like putting a bowling pin in a bowling alley -- ultimately, it's going to get taken out."

[Westlander]

“liquid sapphires”

Yep, they are really gleaming well.

[dennisw]

Good one ... read it

[HisKingdomWillAbolishSinDeath]

The bottom line is if you are going to live in the hills or mountains of Southern California, you need to invest in something like this: Fire Defense

[dennisw]

Good one ... read it

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

It is all the bushes’ fault for catching fire!

California shrubs?

GW is implicated, there needs to be an investigation!

[DB]

Thanks for the link.

Definitely something to consider.

Too bad it is gasoline powered. It should have been propane. It then could have sat many years without being touched and still worked right of the bat if needed. Gas goes bad even with stabilizer in a year or two. What’s worse is, any gas left in the engine gums up making it useless if you don’t keep up with it.

[Jaysun]

The left keeps saying that the problem is the location of the homes. Isn’t that area of California already starving for building sites because of all the land that’s off limits because of the environment?

[DB]

Chaparral has oil in it as do many drought tolerant bushes. That oil goes up like a fire bomb when lit. Grass will just burn through an area, usually without to much damage. These bushes get super hot super fast and light the trees and everything else up around them. I won’t allow these bushes anywhere near my home. At least 100’ clearance is needed from them.

[DB]

It’s the vegetation around the home that’s the problem. Not the home.

[Jaysun]

It’s the vegetation around the home that’s the problem. Not the home.

I understand that. I'm just puzzled by their assertion that the homes shouldn't have been built there to begin with.

[Wonder Warthog]

I had guessed that there had to be some form of eco-nuttiness behind these fires. Figures. Poor homeowners ought to string the eco-freaks up. “Old-growth chapparal”, my ass.

[Brilliant]

It would not be a “flammable corridor” but for the shrubs, though.

[Brilliant]

I personally don’t have any problem if the lib Dems want to ban construction in CA. They are just destroying their own.

[70th Division]

Some of the home owners associations should ban together and sue the stuffing out of some of these environmental groups. That would be fun to watch.

[Arrowhead1952]

GW is implicated, there needs to be an investigation!

Ya think? Did you read the third paragraph of article at the link? They wouldn't do that.

His Web site, Californiachaparral.com, celebrates its diverse plant life, seasonal ponds that gleam like "liquid sapphires" and birdlife that includes bushtits and towhees.

Yep, they sure did. Don't tell me there weren't any other species of birds they could have listed.

[finnsheep]

Oily, resinous shrubs and trees also grow in the East.
It is a real shocker to see how mountain laurel bursts into flame - - not to mention pine trees.

The eco-trend here in some developments is to limit tree removal around homes. In many cases pine trees are over or touching homes and mountain laurel and rhododendron planted against homes. A few years back the drought we had in the Poconos could have taken a similar turn.

[Roses0508]

Oily shrubs, dead pine trees - fuel for the fire to be certain.

My eldest sister and family live in CA (don’t ask me why). The eco nuts have prevented clean up and controlled burns, so the place is just full of fuel.

[NavyCanDo]

You clear out the brush, you get mud slides. You leave it alone you get wild fires.