ROLE OF FIRE IN CALIFORNIA PINE FORESTS 85 
Slope.—Uniform, about 30 per cent, exposure west. 
Stand.—113 live western yellow pines 55 years old, 6 to 24 inches in diameter, 
and from 60 to 80 feet in height, 12 live incense cedars. 
Scars.—10 of the 125 living trees, or 8 per cent, had visible fire scars. 
Insect damage.— 5 trees, 11 to 14 inches in diameter, were killed by insects; 4 
live ove showed new pitch tubes of the red turpentine beetle (Dendroctonus 
valens). 
Kitt’s AREA No. 2 (ArgEaA 0.3 AcRB) 
History.—Area intermittently light burned, latest fire in the spring of 1919, which 
was light and did not spread beyond pine needles, hazard at the present time 
very high, due to great amount of inflammable material. 
Slope.—s50 per cent, northern exposure. 
Stand.—45 live western yellow pines, 6 to 20 inches in diameter by 40 to 80 feet 
in height, 50 to 55 years old; 20 dead trees, the largest 8 inches in diameter 
and 40 feet in height, had been killed by the 1919 and former fires; base of 
crowns 25 to 80 feet from ground, and dead limbs extend to ground. 
Brush.—Abundant stand of old deer brush 10 to 12 feet in height, curled over 
and festooned with needles, dead from shading by trees; a few dead man- 
zanitas also occur. 
Iaiter—1 to 1% inches deep, % inch of the upper layer of this autumn’s nee- 
dles—beneath this a mat % to 1 inch thick of partly decayed needles limbs 
and rotted parts of trees on the ground. 
Scars.—138 trees, or 20 per cent, had visible fire scars. 
(Kirr’s Area No. 3 (ArzaA 0.3 AcRE) 
History.—Area intermittently light burned; last fire was in the spring of 1919; 
no appreciable reduction in inflammable material. 
Slope.—5 per cent, northern exposure. 
Stand.—16 live western yellow pines, averaging 16 inches diameter and 75 feet in 
height; 12 live incense cedars, averaging 12 inches diameter; trunks free of 
limbs up to 10 to 15 feet, and base of crowns 25 to 30 feet from ground. 
Brush.—Practically absent. 
Litter.—11% inches deep, upper layer fallen since spring fire. 
Reproduction.—No small seedlings are present, except along a ditch where pro- 
tection from past fires was afforded, and here are to be found several west- 
ern yellow pine seedlings 2 to 3 years old. A few incense cedar seedlings 
had germinated since the last spring burn. 
Scars.—13 out of 16 western yellow pines and 7 of the 12 cedars were fire 
scarred; 6 of the trees had fire scars 4 to 10 feet high. 
The repeated fires in these areas have undoubtedly been more con- 
centrated in time than have the fires in the virgin forest. There is 
no exact information as to the date when light surface fires began in 
the second-growth stands, but it is quite probable that most of them 
have occurred in the last 20 years. Some of the plots show that the 
fires, though of insufficient intensity to develop as crown fires, were 
nevertheless hot enough to destroy the intermediate and suppressed 
trees from 3 to 5 inches in diameter. In spite of their vigorous 
growth the young trees, through repeated burning of fire scars, are 
eventually burned down, just as in the case of mature timber in the 
virgin forest. . 
A half-acre plot of second growth examined is of particular interest. 
On this area were 42 western yellow pine trees 50 years old and from 
8 to 20 inches in diameter which had survived a severe fire in 1898, 
the Rock Creek fire of 1910, and numerous light surface fires, includ- 
ing the last one, in 1918. Asa result of a heavy windstorm on No- 
vember 26, 1919, 20 of these trees bearing large scars formed originally 
by the 1898 fire and subsequently enlarged by the succeeding fires 
were broken off at the scarred places. None of the 22 unsearred trees 
was thrown during this windstorm. Additional examples could be 
