Texas panhandle fires.

[worth1]

I imagine everyone has heard about these horrific fires in the panhandle of Texas but here is the latest news.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/29/us/texas ... index.html

[karstopography]

IMG_6748.jpeg

I’ve never been Northeast of Amarillo, the area where the fires are burning. Looks like most all the fire is in the Canadian River valley.

[worth1]

IMG_6748.jpegI’ve never been Northeast of Amarillo, the area where the fires are burning. Looks like most all the fire is in the Canadian River valley.

I've been all over that are up into Oklahoma panhandle and east into Oklahoma and west into New Mexico.

I'm highly suspicious of these fires or at least partially being caused by wind farms.

These wind generators have brakes to keep them from running away and they've been highly stressed.

[karstopography]

https://farmandranch.com/property/turkey-track-ranch-1

An example of the type of land and scenery of that Canadian River Valley in Texas

[karstopography]

IMG_6748.jpegI’ve never been Northeast of Amarillo, the area where the fires are burning. Looks like most all the fire is in the Canadian River valley.

I've been all over that are up into Oklahoma panhandle and east into Oklahoma and west into New Mexico.

I'm highly suspicious of these fires or at least partially being caused by wind farms.

These wind generators have brakes to keep them from running away and they've been highly stressed.

I’ve been to the west of Amarillo and into New Mexico. The Canadian river valley is pretty. I like that area west of Amarillo into New Mexico.

[worth1]

If I had the money I would move there in a minute and dump this over crowded godforsaken place.

The Indian flint mines are in the area and south is Cap Rock canyon State Park where a buffalo jump is.

[karstopography]

I checked many of the local newspapers and the national sources. The only thing I saw on one national government run fire monitoring site was that the fires were of human origins.

It is interesting that the question of the origin of the fires hasn’t come up more than it has.

[karstopography]

If I had the money I would move there in a minute and dump this over crowded godforsaken place.

The Indian flint mines are in the area and south is Cap Rock canyon State Park where a buffalo jump is.

I’m with you, I love places without so much sign of people. I like long horizons and lots of sun. Walking in canyon and ravine country is a favorite activity of mine.

Ever read “The Boy Captives “ ? True story of two settler brothers that lived with the Wild Comanche.

They loved that Comanche life and didn’t like their return to “civilization”.

That area was in the heart of Comanche country.

[worth1]

I've never read the book but it was common for kids to want to stay with their captors instead of going home.
All they way back to the beginning of our country.

I recall coming up on a dead wild goat or sheep or whatever it was with huge horns up on a mesa
I grabbed the horns and was considering cutting the head off to have it mounted
I'm the winter time and the wind was blowing.
The dead goat got up and walked off.

I had literally walked up on it without it knowing it.

[worth1]

I think it was yesterday they said it's now the biggest fire in Texas history.
And the wind is supposed to pick up this weekend.

[karstopography]

Probably be good for that river valley land in the long run, but destructive in the short term.

I knew of with a ranch in a west Texas county that had a prescribed burn with qualified supervision get massively out of control, enough that 2,000 acres of live oaks, cactus, mesquite, juniper and grasses were incinerated before a huge fire crew was able to stop it. No structures that I’m aware of other than tower deer blinds, barbed wire fences and power lines were destroyed, but it became a big and prolonged legal battle with insurance companies and neighboring land owners all getting involved. I don’t know all the money that was paid out, but I do know well in excess of a million dollars was distributed and it could have been much more. This was years and years ago.

The land ultimately healed and ended up looking better and being better range for wildlife and livestock with the enrichment of the fire, but there was an ugly period of charred dead junipers and oaks and cinders to weather.

This panhandle fire will likely be hundreds of millions of dollars in payouts and legal battles if not more, especially if some party or multiple parties with deep pockets are involved and you can bet there will be.

[worth1]

The Indians used to burn all the time.

[bower]

Fire cycles are the norm for forests here too.
The conditions for fire are more or less extreme in your part of the world, lately. Drought and high temperatures.
And then there is the buildup of material without small controlled and safe burns management.
Before they know it, much bigger event that is harder on the environment as well as property. Small burns are surrounded by unburnt areas with propagating materials to reseed the burnt area. Some seeds like pines need fire to germinate too. So it's all very auspicious for renewal.
Bigger burns mean bare areas that will suffer more in the drought and take longer to get seeds up.

I think that globally there's such an increase of fire risks, we need to put our heads together and come up with management strategies for difficult situations. Surely we have to optimize our management, everywhere. Last summer in Canada, well they're saying it's a preview of the same again this year. We'll see. Bottom line, ripe conditions for fire, plans are reactive instead of preventive (to a large extent) - and maybe preventive isn't feasible due to the scale of the issue. IDK not expert.
Anyway, a lot of area was affected by the smoke as you know. Just an obvious example of how we all affect one another.
Firefighters are constantly going from one place to another to help out. Lots of cross border examples.
I have work ahead to do to manage my place here which is old growth.
It is interesting how a place where there hasn't been fire in well over living memory (none in my father's day, that would be from 1918) becomes ripe for fire and festooned with fire promoting forest fungus. Burl fungus, witches broom, incrustations of resins, bark lichens, on and on. Some beautiful burl wood they produce. A lot has fallen down.

[pondgardener]

Wind plays a huge part in ripe conditions for fires. Homeless campfires, farmers burning ditches and other events have all contributed recently to fires spreading rapidly with 50+ mph winds here in my area.

[karstopography]

https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather- ... as/1629226

Appears that a downed utility pole was the source of ignition for the largest of the fires.

[worth1]

That's right blame it on electricity.
Electricity is always getting blamed on stuff.
Poor old electricity.

No really I read where something like 7 thousand cattle burned up.
Some will have to be killed because of severe burns and damage to their hooves.

[karstopography]

https://agrilifetoday.tamu.edu/2024/03/ ... ef-prices/

The long and short of it, the fires were bad for the immediate area ranches in harm’s way in the panhandle, but overall, the fires are not going to really move the needle on beef prices or supplies. Texas has just over four million beef cattle, which is at a low from droughts more than anything.

A lot of cattle do move through panhandle feed lots, but those feed lots and out of the area cattle evidently were not impacted in any long term way and whatever cattle did get injured or killed were only from the local population on the ranches there.

I figured that dry land up there would not support very many head per acre.
https://landassociation.org/how-many-co ... your-area/

A ranch needs 20-50 acres per cow/calf unit in unimproved range land in the Texas Panhandle. That’s about 10 times more land per unit needed than it is around here. One reason those ranches up there tend to be huge, no other way to make it on cattle alone without a whole lot of land.