Why Fish Care About Forest Fires

We don't think of rivers and lakes as something that are greatly affected by fires, but it turns out these disasters can have a big effect on the acquatic wildlife that calls these places home.

Hosted by: Hank Green

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[ivanvarela]

Here in BC, Canada we got so good at putting out fires we didn't have any for 50 years. Now all of a sudden the whole forest is burning up, a result of us disrupting the natural fire cycle. There's so much dry tinder on the ground now that the fires continue to burn even under winter snow.

[Hot-Dog-Racing]

more ecology stuff, please! You should do one about how much nitrogen in trees in coastal Alaska, BC and Washington comes from decomposing post-spawn salmonids. It’s such an alarming amount.

Or how mass spectrometry can be used to identify the life cycle or migration of salmonids by looking at strontium isotopes. Salmonids are such amazing species.

[highgrounder]

As a fish, i can confirm that we do indeed care

[sarahmihuc]

Cool! My dad did his PhD thesis on the effects of large wildfires on streams in the rockies & prairies, focusing a bit more on the aquatic insects I think. The wildfires can have devastating effects but like you said they are also a natural part of the ecosystem to some extent and a lot of species need wildfires - from fish to trees & grasses.

[BruceWaynesaysLandBack]

The book “Braiding Sweetgrass” talks about native people who would burn fires on the beach seasonally to welcome the fish, and wouldn’t catch any fish until the 4th DAY of fish arriving. The native group is unfortunately no longer with us- but locals have heard of this legacy and are attempting to restart the tradition, I believe

[jmwall]

Fires in more remote areas can also affect fish when they are literally scooped up and dumped on fires in an effort to put them out. Since it's harder to get water in remote areas, sometimes helicopters with buckets attached will drag those buckets into a nearby lake in order to collect water to then dump on the fire.

[dcptiv]

Here in Australia we do controlled burns every spring to burn off all the small easy to burn stuff. Some plants in our bush need fire to release seeds too.

[ladyofthemasque]

I knew about these kinds of interactions all the way back in the late 1980s, when it was discussed in my high school's science and state history classes...which admittedly was in western Washington, in a time when the forestry industry was still a major industry for the region, and where some of the research in long-term forest sustainability was being undertaken. But the older I get, the more I realize just how progressive and on-top-of-science my school district was, for its time. I really wish more people had such good, solid interest in ongoing scientific discoveries embedded into their educations--if you know any teachers, ask them to consider linking up their students with SciShow and other such resources!

[forest]

This past school year, we learned about this during our Fire Ecology unit in my Environmental Science class!
It was by far my favorite core class ever, and I’m glad that I get to take River Science next year!

[iwontliveinfear]

Hank, my brother is a Florida park ranger and is a senior member of the burn team. He would like you to know there is no such thing as a controlled burn. It is a prescribed burn. You can create fire breaks and take means to contain your prescribed burn, but you cannot control it.

[stephenbullington]

I've had arguments with people about the cause of the massive wild fires lately. They completely blame it on climate change with no other factors. Then I ask them if they've ever gone camping, most of them had. Then I ask them if they've ever built a camp fire, again, they had. I then ask them if they've used tinder and kindling to get their dried logs hot enough to sustain a usable camp fire, again, the answer was yes. My final question to them was, "If you didn't use tinder and kindling, how easy would it be to just hold a match to the dried logs to get them to the point they would sustain a fire?" They said it doesn't work.

My point is, without all the dead fallen trees, and branches, and compiling underbrush (nature's tinder and kindling) you can't have these massive wild fires regardless how hot the climate gets (refer back to the camp fire analogy). Forest management (or the lack thereof) is the biggest contributing factor to the size of today's massive wild fires.

Yes, forest fires have always happened, yes they've been huge in the past. But, if we cleaned up alot of the fallen trees and branches, and just left small underbrush, massive uncontrolled wild fires would be noticeably reduced. Additionally, it would cost significantly less money to employ more forest management personel (eh hem, job creation) then it would for state and federal tax dollars to pay out in damages from these massive fires. It's literally a win/win/win. More jobs (more tax revenue), less tax dollars paid out in damages, and fewer wildfires leading to fewer trees capable of storing carbon. It almost sounds like one of many small contributions to helping stabilize not only the environment, but also a section of the economy.

A multi-factor approach is needed to stabilize the environment. I firmly believe we can have an effect on the global environment, but we can never control it. Nature always win in the end, humans need to decide if we'll still exist with nature, or if nature will just push us out of the equation and start over.

[PaleGhost]

Fish: Don't you hate when forest fires happen?
Fish: What's a fire?

[notyou]

Aww How nice to consult with the fish and find out what their feelings are about fires. You really do care.

[zogar]

It only makes sense that things would evolve to need a good fire now and then. They happen naturally. So the things that survive best are going to be the ones that can not only survive the fire, but that are better able to make use of it's after effects as well.

[FreeCandyGuy]

I believe there’s evidence that Native American groups had been doing a practice similar to this in the Eastern US prior to European contact. By burning the dead grass and creating a clearing that would soon have fresh grass shoots, they could lure more deer to a given spot and improve the hunting success.

[ranimeRAT]

It's worth noting that not everywhere has these fires occur naturally.

It may seem obvious, but I've seen some people claim, for example, fires in Serbia and Brazil as good

[florisr]

It's great to see humans recognize their mistake of always preventing wildfires even though they are often necessary to prevent worse fires.

[lucassirotniak]

The Pine Barrens of New Jersey are another great example of a fire-dependent ecosystem.

[kleatus]

Random question about rivers: could the practice of straightening rivers be contributing to the overall climate crisis? There's plenty of studies that show it's very harmful to fish populations, but could the faster moving water created from straightening rivers also give it less time to evaporate and turn into rain? A straight river would obviously cover less area than a winding river, so would that also contribute to less rainfall across an area? I've tried to find studies about these questions and have had no luck.

[lanehartwig]

A lot of the problem with modern fires is not that the climate is getting hotter (still a problem) it’s that clearcutting forest slows for fires to jump to the canopy. If you have ever been in old growth forest you know that you can easily see for hundreds of meters without brush obstructing your view. It’s a lot harder for embers to jump 20 vs a fire. Touching other trees