Life returns to scorched forest

Thursday, June 22, 2000 | 11:20 a.m.

The Buck Springs fire blazed through Trough Springs canyon two weeks ago, but creatures by wing and by claw have returned to create islands of life amid the ashes.

In this world blackened by flames, birds, butterflies and beetles surround the trickling springs where delicate columbine and hardy thistle plants native to Southern Nevada's Spring Mountains cling to the scorched soils.

Within the 2,000 burned-out acres are hills covered in wildflowers and green pinyon and juniper pine trees -- islands of hope for biologists and archaeologists searching for a return of the area's natural balance.

Forest officials had worried two weeks ago that the fire could seriously threaten some endangered species that are endemic to the Spring Mountains. But a tour of the fire-ravaged area Monday, while not turning up any threatened plants or animals, gave officials great reason for optimism.

The hills below Wheeler Pass on the western side of the mountain range reflect a mosaic that shows the effect of several forest fires over the past 20 years, U.S. Forest Service biologist Debbie Couche said. Most were much smaller fires than this month's blaze.

"Life returns so quickly here," Couche said, smiling as she watched a young buck mule deer disappear into the blackened woods that once thrived with scrub oak and pine trees.

Some trees towering on the edge of the fire line now are a reddish brown, scorched by the wind-driven flames ignited by a single lightning bolt.

Time will tell whether these trees, some estimated as old as 100 years, will survive, Couche said. If their roots and interiors are intact, the pinyons will live.

The first trees to recover could well be scrub oak if the summer brings gentle rains. But, Couche pointed out, the fire season is just beginning, and the flood season is still ahead. The summer could bring more damage.

Couche poured drops of water on the ground after scraping blackened soot from the soil's surface. Sometimes the drop disappeared in seconds. Less than 2 feet away from the first hole, the drop rested on the surface for what seemed like eternity.

If the Southern Nevada monsoon season from July through September brings gully-washer storms, then there will be some erosion, she said. But at the rate those water drops disappeared into the earth, enough soil will stay in place to offer footing for young plants to take root. The rain then will encourage their regrowth.

No historical structures were destroyed in the Buck Springs fire in another stroke of luck, Forest Service archaeologist Kathleen Sprowl said.

The Tecopa Charcoal Kilns, two foundations and a rebuilt kiln used in the last century to turn wood from the surrounding trees into charcoal to fire mining forges, stand behind a chain link fence with Indian rice grass, mallow and mint growing in their rocky foundations. The fire never touched them.

The kilns were used from 1875 to 1910, when railroad cars brought coke from Eastern states to the mines, Sprowl said.

In the foothills at the far edge of the fire, white flowers of prickly poppies and purple and red penstemmons bloom as far as the eye can see, replacing growth lost in a 1997 blaze that engulfed a few hundred acres.

The Forest Service does not plan to replant the area. "Now we'll let nature take its course, and the insects and the winds will help reseed the area," Couche said.

Climbing along Trough Springs, the forest officials saw four different butterfly species, a host of birds -- even a robin -- and a Palmer's chipmunk darting under a rock ledge.

The chipmunk and two types of butterflies are endemic to the Spring Mountains, Couche said, part of life that evolved 15,000 years ago when a wetter, more lush climate existed in the Las Vegas Valley. Life moved from the valley lakes to the mountains as the climate shifted.

The delicate ecology was spared partly because bulldozers were not needed to fight the fires. "Hot shot" crews from all over the West hand dug 2-feet-wide bare swaths to contain the flames, Couche said.

Forest Service guidelines do not allow bulldozers to fight forest fires unless people or their homes are threatened.

But recent home-building in the mountains concerns Sprowl. Cold Creek, for example, boasted empty lots 10 years ago. Today the community has 150 homes. Mountain Springs, Mount Charleston, Lee Canyon and Kyle Canyon all have growing populations.

Those homes nestled in the trees pose a heightened risk for forest fire and are at great risk from such fires, Sprowl said.

"It's an inherent danger that people need to be aware of, and clear nearby land of brush and trees," she said. "People like the trees and want the trees next to their structures, but they have to remember that fire from trash at a cabin can spark a forest fire."