“Untrammeling the Wilderness: Restoring Natural Conditions Through the Return of Human-ignited Fire”

“Untrammeling the Wilderness: Restoring Natural Conditions Through the Return of Human-ignited Fire” with Clare Boerigter, Wilderness Fire Research Fellow for the Aldo Leopold Wilderness Research Institute and Jonathan Coop, Professor of Environment and Sustainability at Western Colorado University This presentation is part of Wilderness Workshop's Naturalist Nights winter speaker series, a partnership with the Aspen Center for Environmental Studies and Roaring Fork Audubon. Date and time: Wednesday, March 5, 6-7pm Location: Community Hall at the Third Street Center (520 S Third St, Carbondale, CO 81623) About the presentation: Historical and contemporary policies and practices have resulted in over a century of fire exclusion across much of the US. Within designated wilderness areas, the exclusion of fire constitutes a fundamental and ubiquitous act of trammeling. Here we present a framework assessing the substantial, long-term, and negative effects of fire exclusion on the natural conditions of fire-adapted wilderness ecosystems, including unnatural fuel loads and anomalously severe fires, compounded by a warmer and drier climate. To untrammel more than a century of fire exclusion, human-ignited fire may be critical to restoring the natural character of fire-adapted wilderness landscapes while also supporting ecocultural restoration efforts sought by Indigenous peoples. About the speakers: Clare Boerigter is a fire research fellow, science writer, and former wildland firefighter for the U.S. Forest Service. Her work on fire, climate change, environmental research and more has appeared in publications for the U.S. Forest Service and the University of Minnesota, and in literary magazines such as Guernica. In 2021, she graduated with an MFA in creative nonfiction from the University of Minnesota; she is currently at work on a science memoir about her experiences as a woman in the world of wildland firefighting. Jonathan Coop, Ph.D, is a professor in the Clark Family School of Environment and Sustainability at Western Colorado University. He is a forest ecologist who studies how natural systems are affected by land use legacies, altered disturbance regimes, and a changing climate. Coop also works with land managers to develop and test intervention strategies to sustain forest ecosystem function during an era of intensifying change. If you are in need of translation or American Sign Language (ASL) services, please contact Erin Riccio, erin@wildernessworkshop.org. Unable to make the presentation in Carbondale? Catch Clare and Jonathan's presentation the following evening in Aspen or virtually through Wilderness Workshop's YouTube channel after the event.