Firefighters Set the Everglades Ablaze

'Tis the season to burn the Everglades

By HANK TESTER

Updated 8:00 PM EDT, Wed, Dec 16, 2009

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If you see a plume of smoke rising from the Everglades these days, don't call the firefighters.

Chances are they are already there and they started it.

The target Wednesday was 1,500 acres of saw grass. This was not the work of arsonists. Firefighters from the Everglades National Park were hoping for a "good burn."

They have been igniting controlled burns since 1958. The philosophy is: burn it now or risk Mother Nature doing it with a lightning strike or some careless camper causing a fire that rages out of control.

The Everglades Fire Starters

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The Everglades Fire Starters

Fire is good for the Everglades. Just ask Rick Anderson who heads the fire management office for the Everglades National Park.

"The saw grass benefits greatly by the vegetation being burned around it. It is successful because it does burn."

The Everglades is all about water and it is all about fire. The experts will tell you that, despite the public perception that all fires are bad, fires generate growth.

"The Everglades is coral rock with plants growing in the water," says Rudy Evanson a Park fire expert. He explains that Everglade fires produce ash which falls into the muck, and acts as a fertilizer.

Within days of a burn, small shoots of saw grass pop up in the charred muck. It does not take life anytime at all to regenerate in the Everglades. It is a process as long as the earth has been the earth.

There is about a million acres of flammable foliage within the national park. That's plenty of fuel for big fires. What the firefighters and their fire bosses accomplish with these staged burns is fight the fire on their own terms.

"The fire is going to happen anyway, eventually. We set the fires, our fire trucks are in place, our helicopters and fire bombers are set to go, we are at full staff" said one long time firefighter.

A series of small set fires can prevent a huge fire by clearing the vulnerable areas of overgrown and dry grasses. It is kind of like resetting the hands on Mother Nature's clock. On this day, an Everglades fire is a good thing.