Forestry and Fuels Program
Fuels Division
Hazardous fuel reduction in the heart of Trinity County
The Watershed Research and Training Center’s Fuels Division is the largest employer in our organization, with five crews of hard-working, local sawyers and one masticator operator implementing fuel reduction projects during the field season. These crews treat countless acres of Trinity County forests on private and public lands, thinning and reducing fuel loads to meet prescriptions for healthy and wildfire resilient landscapes.
Landscape level projects
Includes working across boundaries of public and private land to create fuel breaks on strategic ridgelines and thin densely packed forest stands. This critical work is performed through mastication or hand crews and removes hazardous fuels in order to create healthier, more fire resilient forests.
Fuel breaks, like the South Hayfork Fuel Break, highlighted in the video below, are swaths of land where combustible vegetation, both living and dead, has been reduced by thinning trees and shrubs and limbing up branches to remove ladder fuels. This critical work creates anchor points of relative safety where emergency personnel can defend or burn to combat the progress of a spreading wildfire.
Learn about the Mad Ridge Fuel Break by checking out our blog post!
Drone footage by Timothy Tremayne
Community level projects
Includes work on private property within the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) that prioritizes the creation of defensible space around homes and shaded fuel breaks along evacuation routes to make our rural communities more fire safe. Projects often focus on reducing fuel in the Home Ignition Zone, an activity identified as a priority by Firewise USA and in the Trinity County Community Wildfire Protection Plan.
Grant funded programs, like the countywide Community Chipping Program, work with homeowners in Trinity County to chip piles of hazardous fuel prepared by the property owner at no cost. WRTC works closely with the Trinity County Resource Conservation District (TCRCD) and Trinity County Fire Safe Council (TCFSC) to improve the defensibility of neighborhoods in Trinity County and maintain Firewise USA status and Certification in communities at risk.
Learn more about Firewise Communities in Trinity County at firesafetrinity.org
Sign up for Community Chipping or learn about fuel reduction projects in your community by emailing fuels@thewatershedcenter.com
Fuels Division FAQs
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Fuel Reduction is the manipulation (including combustion or removal) of hazardous fuel, like brush and ladder fuels, to reduce the likelihood of ignition and/or lessen the potential damage caused by wildfire. WRTC fuels crews reduce fuel by chipping, lop and scatter, or piling cut fuel for burning by the Fire Program.
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Defensible space is an area, natural or manmade, where material capable of causing a fire to spread has been treated, cleared, reduced, or changed in order to provide a barrier between an advancing wildland fire and the loss to life, property, or resources. It is defined as an area with a minimum of 100 feet around a structure that is cleared of flammable brush or vegetation. Distance from the structure and the degree of fuels treatment vary with vegetation type, slope, density, and other factors.
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A shaded fuel break retains select vegetation within the treatment area, promoting native species while eliminating the understory, ladder fuels, and invasive species. By doing so, shaded fuel breaks effectively alter wildfire behavior in a positive way, while simultaneously fostering the development of a thriving and resilient forest ecosystem.
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Fuel reduction protects homes and the natural spaces that are valued by residents. Ecological benefits include reducing invasive species, improvement of wildlife habitat and rangeland for grazing, and protection of wetlands and riparian corridors.
