Mooretown Tribal Landscape Cultural Fire Project

The project area experienced 90-100% mortality during the 2020 North Complex Fire emergency, resulting in a vegetation community characterized by wide-scale even-aged resprouting brush. To meet ecological and cultural objectives, the Tribe desires to reburn this landscape in smaller sections, ranging from (approximately) 3 to 106 acres. This would promote an uneven-aged mosaic of vegetation, benefiting oak woodlands, culturally important shrubs and geophytes, and wildlife habitat. To this end, 38 subunits have been delineated (see map). This project would 1) create fire control features between these beneficial fire subunits (where control features don’t already exist) and then 2) apply beneficial fire under prescription to one or more subunits at a time. To create the new fire control features, crews would use manual means (e.g. metal-bladed weed whips, loppers) and non-ground-disturbing mechanical means (e.g. mowers) to remove vegetation along fireline corridors 3 feet wide. Next, these corridors would be scraped down to bare mineral soil. Firelines would be designed to be maintained as permanent features, since these units will be re-burned over and over every few years as the core of a Tribal land management strategy. A total of about 3.2 miles of new fireline would be cleared. At a 3foot width, this amounts to a total disturbance acreage of 1.16 acres. BMPs built into the project minimize water quality impacts. Subunits would be broadcast-burned in fall. Some burning of piles/invasive weeds could take place in spring, after visual bird checks. Work to be done on Federal lands would require separate NEPA clearance. Work to be done on adjacent private non-Tribal lands, if any, would require signed access/work agreements with those landowner(s). Broadcast burning would occur outside of nesting season (i.e. work would be conducted Aug 16-Jan 31) or pre-implementation nesting bird surveys would be done 1-3 days prior.