Buckeye Reporter

Although the ground is still very moist, prescribed fire crews have detected good conditions for beginning our first opportunity this spring to bring back good fire to protect our community and watershed from severe summer fires. Grayback Forestry and Lomakatsi Restoration Project are managing a controlled burn on private-land west of town high above Ashland Mine Road on behalf of the Ashland Forest Resiliency all-lands program.

Smoke Could Impact Neighborhoods on the Western Edge of Ashland

• Neighborhood Impact: Based on last year’s burns in this location, we know that smoke can impact homes in the Wright’s Creek neighborhood, Ashland Mine Road to North Main St, and down to Hwy 99 at Valley View Road in the evening and overnight hours.
• Recommended Precautions: If you smell smoke; consider staying inside, close windows and turn on air filters. Visit smokewiseashland.org for health recommendations.
• Smoke Visible: Smoke will be visible during the day from Ashland, Talent, and much of the valley with views toward Ashland. Please do not report smoke unless it is not located in the area of the burn.

We recognize the recent escaped burn in New Mexico is a tragic, yet rare event, and we want to assure you that although we cannot eliminate all risk, we take safety seriously by burning during safe conditions. We are adequately staffing burns with professional firefighters and using modern tools like drone imagery to monitor our burns. The Grayback Forestry team has been monitoring weather forecasts and fuel moisture to prepare for this first burn of the spring season. Crews who manage smoke, fire conditions on the ground and crew safety are monitoring from the ground level to even above the controlled burn. In the photo below, you can see last year’s drone monitoring that happened as the prescribed fire progressed.

More Information

• For burn day text notifications, text the word "WATERSHED" in the message line to 888777 as the recipient. You will get an auto-confirmation text when you sign-up. You can also download the Everbridge/Nixle app to get alerts.
• Ashland Forest Resiliency website
• Sign-up for email alerts at ashlandwatershed.org
• AFR Facebook
• Smoke and Health Info: smokewiseashland.org
• See controlled burns on the watershed camera

Original source can be found here.