75 



The major amount of dense stands of trees we see today in the 

 groves are all a result of what we would have called catastrophic 

 fires in past years. Very few fires have a frequency of once a cen- 

 tury or once every two centuries. 



Mr. DOOLEY. Mr. Gasser, do you want to comment on the rel- 

 ative — the conditions, if we go into a status quo-type of situation, 

 where we have some of our forest, our sequoia groves, that have 

 had the regeneration primarily of white firs, and are in a shaded 

 area now, and anyone that has gone out into some of the existing 

 groves have seen the growth in the white fir? There are no sequoia 

 redwoods that are being regenerated under that condition. 



Mr. Gasser. And so we certainly need to bum, but I'm concerned 

 about the stand — destroying fire. 



I agree with Mr. Rundel that we are going to get giant sequoia 

 reproduction in that case. But we are also going to lose thousands 

 of acres, displace probably a lot of people, and do some serious 

 damage, I would expect, to the ecosystem in terms of erosion, on 

 a short-term basis. 



We are a pretty short-term blip here, I think. And to look at the 

 management that has gone on and to call it nothing but bad, is 

 pretty short term. Come back in 50 years, if you can. 



Mr. Brown. I'll be back. 



Mr. Gasser. I think what we will see is that this dynamic situa- 

 tion rebuilds itself. 



Mr. Brown. I was planning on only coming back every 20 years, 

 but I will make it every 50 years now. 



I wanted, for my own edification, to understand the threats to 

 the sequoia, which I understand are not fire, particularly. In fact, 

 they thrive on fire, at least part of the time. It releases seeds and 

 provides for regeneration. 



The question is, if you allow a dense undercover to develop — 

 white fir or whatever — which is probably not a natural situation, 

 is that threatening to the life of the sequoia, an uncontrolled fire 

 in that kind of a situation, or do the sequoias survive that kind of 

 thing? 



Mr. Rundel. As I understand your question, sequoias, depending 

 on the size, if you have a fire in a grove with small sapling sequoia, 

 they will be killed by the fire, as will the other white woods in the 

 area. 



Mr. Brown. The small saplings will? 



Mr. Rundel. Yes. The large trees are very protected. And cer- 

 tainly large scars, which havo fire openings in them, can provide 

 entry point for fire. So large trees are occasionally killed by fires, 

 particularly where there are large forest fires. 



Mr. Brown. I understood from some of the earlier testimony that 

 we may have created a situation in which we have provided a lad- 

 der for the fire to move up into the canopies of the sequoias and, 

 hence, threaten them by not logging these under — whatever you 

 call them. 



Mr. Rundel. I agree with Don that we need manipulation and 

 we need burning in the understory. We can't make it a museum. 



Mr. Brown. I don't perceive this bill as prohibiting any kind of 

 reasonable management. It is recommended by the Science Advi- 

 sory Committee. We do not proscribe any of these. 



