Fire as a Tool in Southern Pine 



523 



appearing damage. As a result, 90,000 

 acres of the Osceola National Forest 

 have been burned with a negligible 

 amount of damage. Most of the meas- 

 urable damage occurred on those 

 burns deliberately pushed to identify 

 safe limits of action too early or too 

 late in the season and too long after 

 a rain. 



Foresters who have inspected and 

 studied the results obtained on the 

 Osceola National Forest have con- 

 cluded that the stands benefited from 

 the treatment. 



A significant fact: This 150,000- 

 acre forest is heavily stocked with 

 range cattle, but incendiarism has 

 nearly disappeared, and the average 

 area burned annually from wildfires 

 of all causes has dropped from 3.4 to 

 0.033 percent of the area. 



THE RESULTING CATCHES of long- 



leaf pine seedlings on areas where the 

 mineral soil has been exposed by burn- 

 ing a year or less before a seed fall 

 have been successful. An example: 

 On 26,000 acres in southern Alabama, 

 burned just before the 1947 seed fall, 

 a catch grading from satisfactory to 

 heavy was obtained on 90 percent of 

 the area, and at 1 percent of the cost 

 of planting. On many burned areas 

 following the period of seed germina- 

 tion, examination showed that good 

 catches can be obtained on roughs a 



year old or less ; that on a 2-year rough, 

 there is some catch but not satisfactory 

 stocking; and on roughs of 3 years or 

 more, the catch is insignificant. 



Results we obtained from seedbed 

 burns in units of more than 300 acres 

 in size are not in line with results from 

 small-area experimental burns. Ro- 

 dents are pretty well eliminated from 

 the larger burns, and their damage 

 is confined to edges. The seed-loss 

 damage characteristic from bird con- 

 centration on small burns is reduced 

 when they can feed over larger areas. 

 Increased distances from brown spot 

 infection sources delays infection of 

 the new seedlings. 



BROWN SPOT needle disease is pres- 

 ent in varying degrees over the entire 

 pine belt; mostly the infection on un- 

 burned grass-stage seedlings ranges 

 from serious to epidemic. The effects 

 are equally adverse to natural seed- 

 lings or planted stock. 



Area examinations usually reveal a 

 considerable degree of infection on 

 3-year-old stock. Then the disease has 

 not seriously reduced the vitality of the 

 plant, but if it is not overcome, it will 

 spread rapidly, increase in severity, 

 progressively weaken the seedlings, and 

 destroy all but a few stragglers in the 

 following 3 to 5 years. 



A fire during the dormant period 

 (late December through February) 

 will control the infection if it is hot 

 enough to defoliate the grass-stage 

 seedlings, and has flames high enough 

 to consume the infection-carrying 

 needles on any reproduction up to 10 

 feet in height. If burned early enough, 

 before the infection has reduced the 

 vitality of the seedlings, the seedlings 

 will produce a full crown of healthy 

 needles the following growing period. 

 The speed with which a reinfection 

 may occur appears to be proportionate 

 to the size of the area given a sanitary 

 burn. A burn of 40 acres is hardly 

 worth while. The disease left in the 

 surrounding unburned area will rein- 

 feet to a depth of several hundred feet 

 within a year. 



