HELENA – Unusually wet weather has reduced the threat of wildfires in western Montana this season, but all that rain has resulted in high grass that is ready to burn in the central and eastern parts of the state, federal and state fire officials said Monday.
The officials briefed Gov. Brian Schweitzer on the wildfire outlook after the late-melting snowpack and frequent rain this spring delayed the start of the fire season by weeks.
“This is an extraordinary year in which we are likely to miss the fire season in western Montana,” Schweitzer said. “But we’re likely to still have some fire season in September and October in central and eastern Montana, and we’ll be prepared when it comes.”
The number of acres that have burned so far this year is at a record low, and the wet spring has meant that higher elevations are just now reaching their greening peaks, said Bryan Henry, a meteorologist with the Northern Rockies Coordination Center.
Trees and brush in the higher elevations of western Montana are weeks behind the normal time it takes them to dry, though grasses in lowlands can be a fire threat if there is strong wind, Henry said.
Another possible fire threat is to the forests in southern and southwestern Montana, where mountain pine beetles have killed large numbers of trees.
“Those could really go at any time in the right conditions, with a strike at the wrong place at the wrong time,” Henry said.
The responsibility for fighting wildfires across Montana’s patchwork of state, federal and local jurisdictions is shared by various federal agencies such as the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management, along with the state Department of Natural Resources down to the county level.
Each agency reported minimal fire activity in their areas so far this year. State Forester Bob Harrington said the number of fires on state and private land this year is at 42 percent of the five-year average, with less than 0.1 percent of acreage burned.
“The only smoke we’ve been seeing out of Missoula is at the end of a doobie,” the governor joked.
Schweitzer said the damp conditions may be an opportunity to hold more controlled burns in beetle-kill forests and allow natural-occurring fires to burn longer, reducing the number of dead trees.
Patti Koppenol, a fire and aviation director for the U.S. Forest Service, said her agency is looking at that possibility and will evaluate each situation on a case-by-case basis for the five or six weeks left in the fire season.
Schweitzer also said homeowners should take advantage of this year’s likely lull to prepare their properties for more devastating fire seasons in the future. He urged residents to clear dying trees, the brush leading up to their houses and the needles from their gutters.