Dr. Tim Ingalsbee is the director of the Western Fire Ecology Center, a research and educational organization which studies and reports on fire related forest management issues throughout the West. For ten years, Ingalsbee worked as a wildland firefighter for the U.S. Forest Service and the National Park Service. He has trained and supervised hot shot crews throughout the West in minimum impact suppression techniques. Here Dr. Ingalsbee answers a few questions about wildfires.

How big is this summer's fire season?
When it comes to fire ecology, size doesn't matter. In fact, we need to see more acres burning, under appropriate conditions, with beneficial ecological effects. The real issue is the intensity and severity of fires. Are the fires burning hot? Killing most or all of the vegetation? Impacting the soil? These are the real issues. Not the size. Unfortunately, federal agencies only measure the size of fires. They really don't assess their severity.

How does logging affect wildfires?
In general, fires burning through native forests or unmanaged old growth forests are less severe than fires burning through managed stands that have been logged, roaded or grazed. Because logging takes away the most fire-resistant big old trees and leaves behind the smaller trees. The disturbance caused by logging causes a lot of growth of brush and grasses and there's lots of logging debris or slash left behind. These sites tend to be hotter and drier, causing more intense fire, resulting in more severe fire effects.

What about protecting peoples' homes?
This has become the burning issue of our time: How can we protect homes and communities that have invaded fire-prone ecosystems? And homeowners who are largely ignorant of the fact that they've built their homes in a fire plain are now experiencing floods: floods of fire. Homeowners could do some simple, inexpensive things to greatly increase their home's survivability from fire. Things like having a non-flammable roof. Cutting the brush. Mowing the grass. Raking the pine needles that accumulate every year. Don't store your firewood under your deck or next to your walls. Don't store your propane tank next to your home. Simple things. You don't need a government grant, an environmental impact statement or anyone else's approval to do this. It's really prudent behavior. And just these things can improve a home's survivability rate by 90%.

Why have fire management policies stayed the way they are?
Our national psyche is still held captive to a cartoon bear that is promoting the message absolutely contrary to the natural species. Real bears love burns. Burns create the berries. Burns create the large dead trees that they hibernate in, and that form salmon spawning pools. All of us have a responsibility, including the news media that thrives on the hype and hysteria that wildfires can create. The sooner we educate ourselves about fire ecology, fire's beneficial effects, the sooner we prepare our communities and fireproof our homes. I think that will take a lot of fear and hysteria out of fires. We can then begin a more rational fire management policy.

So, what's the solution?
It would begin first with developing fire management plans. It may shock people, but very few of the national forests have a fire management plan in place, so when a fire strikes it's basically up to a couple fire staff people in the dark of night to whip up a plan and then we're just fighting these fires blindly, at great cost to taxpayers. Already the Forest Service has exhausted its budget of $300 million. So it's borrowing funds from a lot of other activities.

More on wildfires
"We had to destroy the village to save it"
Federal Fire Sham
Yellowstone: The Vital Role of Wildfires
Solutions: Fire Prevention
U.S. Wildfire History