LEAF's Wisconsin K-12
WILDLAND FIRE LESSON GUIDE
Why
Wildland Fire?
Guide
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NEW!
Fire
Dependent Ecosystem
Supplemental
Resources
Forest fire has become a major issue that governments, landowners, and industries have had to deal with over the past several years. Although historically Wisconsin has experienced major catastrophic fire events, conditions in recent years have limited large scale fire.
Even so, Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources fire crews annually respond to 1,500 fires that burn over 5,000 acres. Local fire departments respond to many more forest-related fires that fall in their jurisdiction. How do most of these fires start? Ninety percent of all forest related fires in Wisconsin are started by humans. LEAF's Wildland Fire Lesson Guide supplements LEAF's educational materials, focusing on the economic, social, and ecological implications of wildland fire in Wisconsin.
Drought tends to go through cycles and eventually, conditions may again return to Wisconsin that set the stage for large scale fire. Each year 3,000 new parcels of forest are carved out of existing forest land holdings. On many of these parcels homesteads, summer homes, and hunting cabins are being built. More and more people are moving to the woods and estimates predict that housing density in areas like the Northwoods will continue to rise.
If Wisconsin experiences a large catastrophic fire event, the cost in just human property would be extremely large. As more individuals move into forested areas, the number of fires and the possibility for catastrophic fires increase. Burning debris, sparks from equipment like chain saws and all terrain vehicles, and campfires/ash disposal are the most common ways that humans cause fire. Each of these modes of fire generation are preventable. Education is a key prevention tool to develop an informed and caring citizenry that will take action to prevent useless fires and that support the use of prescribed burning as a management tool.
You can view the
LEAF Conceptual Guide to K-12 Wildland Fire Education in Wisconsin
(PDF), used to create this guide.
NEW!
You can view and
download the LEAF Wildland Fire Lesson Guide:
All PDF files:
K-1st
Grade Lessons
2nd-3rd
Grade Lessons
4th
grade Lessons
5th-6th
Grade Lessons
7th-8th
Grade Lessons
9th-12th
Grade Lessons
Additional resources related to LEAF's wildland fire lessons are available on our Supplemental Resources page. These include maps, PowerPoints and more!
Fire Dependent Ecosystem
Fire has been an important part of forest and grassland
ecosystems in central and eastern North America for 25 to 30 million
years. Many plants and animals have adapted to survive and flourish
after wildland fires. For the past five to six thousand years, half
of the state of Wisconsin has been covered by fire-dependant and
fire-tolerant ecosystems such as prairies, sedge meadows, oak
savannas, and pine barrens. Periodic distributed fire has created a
mosaic of ecosystems across the landscape with some ecosystems
isolated from wildland fire and others periodically exposed.
Wisconsin's ecosystem diversity depends on the periodic occurrence
of wildland fire.
These are Wisconsin's fire dependent ecosystems:
Pine Barren
A savanna community characterized by scattered jack pines or less
commonly red pines. Sometimes mixed with scrubby Hill's and bur
oaks. Interspersed with openings in which shrubs such as hazelnuts
and prairie willow dominate. The flora often contains species
characteristic of heaths such as blueberries, bearberry, sweet fern,
and sand cherry. Also present are dry sand prairie species such as
June grass, little bluestem, silky and sky-blue asters, lupine,
blazing-stars, and western sunflower. Pines may be infrequent, even
absent, in some stands in northern Wisconsin and elsewhere because
of past logging, altered fire regimes, and an absence of seed
source.
Great Lakes Barren
Great Lakes Barrens exist on only one sandy site on Lake Superior.
The dominant trees in this open stand are wind- and fire-deformed
red pine trees with white pine also present. The understory consists
of dense growths of lichens with scattered thickets of common
juniper, early blueberry, and huckleberry. Other common plants are
hairgrass, ticklegrass, false-heather, and bearberry.
Oak Barren
Black oak is the dominant tree in this fire-adapted savanna
community of dry sites, but other oaks may also be present. Common
understory species are lead plant, black-eyed susan, round-headed
bush clover, goats rue, june grass, little bluestem, flowering
spurge, frostweed, false Solomon's-seal, spiderwort, and lupine.
Distribution of this community is mostly in southwestern, central,
and west central Wisconsin.
Central Sands Pine-Oak Forest
A forest community associated with the Central Sands region on dry
sites with acid sandy soils. The dominant trees are white, red, and
jack pine, oak, and red maple. The understory typically consists of
huckleberry, early blueberry, bracken fern, wood anemone, and Penn
sedge.
Northern Dry Forest
A forest community that occurs on nutrient-poor sites with
excessively drained sandy or rocky soils. The primary historic
disturbance regime was catastrophic fire at intervals of decades to
approximately a century. Dominant trees of mature stands include
jack and red pines and/or Hill's oak. Large acreages of this forest
type were cut and burned during the logging of the late 19th and
early 20th century. Much of the land was then colonized by white
birch and/or quaking aspen or converted to pine plantations starting
in the 1920s. Common understory shrubs are hazelnuts, early
blueberry, and brambles. Common herbs include bracken fern,
starflower, barren-strawberry, cow-wheat, trailing arbutus, and
members of the shinleaf family.
Southern Dry Forest
Oaks are the dominant species in this upland forest community of dry
sites. White oak and black oak are dominant, often with mixtures of
red and bur oaks and black cherry. In the well-developed shrub
layer, brambles, gray dogwood, and American hazelnut are common.
Frequent herbaceous species are wild geranium, false Solomon's-seal,
hog-peanut, and woodland sunflower.
Oak Opening
An oak-dominated savanna community in which there is less than 50%
tree canopy. Historically, oak openings occurred on wet to dry
sites. The few remnants are mostly on drier sites, with the wetter
openings almost totally destroyed by conversion to agricultural or
residential uses, and by the encroachment of other woody plants due
to fire suppression. Bur, white, and black oaks are dominant in
mature stands as large, open-grown trees with distinctive limb
architecture. Shagbark hickory is sometimes present. American
hazelnut is a common shrub, and while the herb layer is similar to
those found in oak forests and prairies, with many of the same
grasses and forbs present, there are some plants and animals that
reach their optimal abundance in the openings.
Oak Woodland
A forest that is structurally intermediate between Oak Openings and
Southern Dry Forest. The tree canopy cover is high, but frequent
low-intensity fires and possibly (in pre-settlement times) browsing
by herbivores such as elk, bison, and deer kept the understory
relatively free of shrubs and saplings. Much additional information
is needed but it appears that at least some plants (certain legumes,
grasses, and composites among them) reached their highest abundance
here.
Dry Prairie
This grassland community occurs on dry soils, usually on steep south
or west facing slopes or at the summits of river bluffs with
sandstone or dolomite near the surface. Short to medium-sized
prairie grasses: little bluestem, side-oats grama, hairy grama, and
prairie dropseed, are the dominants in this community. Common shrubs
and forbs include lead plant, silky aster, flowering spurge, purple
prairie-clover, cylindrical blazing-star, and gray goldenrod.
Mesic Prairie
This grassland community occurs on rich, moist, well-drained sites.
The dominant plant is the tall grass, big bluestem. The grasses
little bluestem, Indian grass, porcupine grass, prairie dropseed,
and tall switchgrass are also frequent. The forb layer is diverse.
Common species include the prairie docks, lead plant, heath and
smooth asters, sand coreopsis, prairie sunflower,
rattlesnake-master, flowering spurge, beebalm, prairie coneflower,
and spiderwort.
Supplemental Resources
More resources are available on our Supplemental Resources page.
Unit 7-8
Living With Fire (PDF)
Wisconsin DNR publication that provides an overview of the
Cottonville Fire, factors affecting wildland fire, fire history, and
property protection tips.
Unit 9-12
General Wildland Fire Information
- Wildland fire includes two types of fire; wildfire and prescribed fire. Wisconsin wildfires can start through human causes like debris burning or arson or natural causes such as lightning. Prescribed fires are used to mimic ecological or natural fires that have been part of ecosystems throughout history. Prescribed fires are ignited and controlled by land managers.
- For fire to ignite and spread, three elements must be present heat, fuel, and oxygen. There must be heat to start and continue the combustion process, fuel to burn, and oxygen to facilitate combustion. The three elements can be seen as sides of the fire triangle. If any one of the sides is removed, the fire will extinguish.
- Fuel characteristics determine how intense a wildland fire burns and how far it spreads. These characteristics include the type of fuel, its chemistry, size, and shape. The quantity of fuel and the way it is arranged also influence fire behavior. Examples of fuel include trees and tree litter, grass, shrubs, and logging slash (piles of brush left behind after an area is logged). Light fuels, like grass, burn very fast and hot. While heavy fuels, like logging slash, burn for long periods of time. Light fuels dry much faster. Their moisture varies throughout the day as temperature, humidity, and wind speed changes. Often the fire danger increases during the day and decreases as night approaches.
- Weather and topography are major influences on fire behavior. Weather is constantly changing because of local, regional, and continental influences making it difficult to predict fire behavior. Weather influences can dry fuels and cause fire to spread. The three most common weather characteristics that determine when fire danger is high are moisture in the air, temperature, and wind. In Wisconsin, most dangerous wildfires occur during the months of March, April, and May. This time of year, known as the fire season, is especially dangerous because much of the landscape is absent of living plants, and trees have not yet grown leaves.
Topic
1 - Causes of wildfire in Wisconsin
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources - Fire Prevention and
Safety
http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/forestry/fire/fire-ps.htm
Wisconsin Natural Resources Magazine - Fire's Role in Nature
http://www.wnrmag.com/supps/2005/apr05/nature.htm#wild
National Fire Plan
http://www.fireplan.gov/overview/States/documents/2006_WI_Adam-County_NFP.pdf
Topic
2 - Wildland/urban interface
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources - Wildland Urban Interface
http://dnr.wi.gov/org/land/forestry/fire/prevention/wui/index.htm
UW-Madison SILVIS Lab - The Wildland Urban Interface
http://silvis.forest.wisc.edu/projects/WUI_Main.asp
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources - Fire in the Wildland
Urban Interface
http://dnr.wi.gov/org/land/forestry/SmartForestry/toolbox/pdf/wui.pdf
Topic
3 - Prescribed fire
USDA Forest Service - Prescribed Fire
http://www.fs.fed.us/fire/fireuse/rxfire/rx_index.html
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources - Prescribed Burns
http://www.dnr.state.wi.us/org/land/wildlife/articles/prescribed.htm
Wisconsin Natural Resources Magazine - Fire's Role in Nature
http://www.wnrmag.com/supps/2005/apr05/nature.htm
The Nature Conservancy - Postcards from the Field
http://www.nature.org/wherewework/northamerica/states/maryland/news/news1912.html
Forestry Facts - Prescribed Burning and Wildfire
http://forest.wisc.edu/extension/publications/9.pdf
Topic
4 - Protecting property from wildfire
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources - Firewise
http://dnr.wi.gov/org/land/forestry/fire/prevention/firewise/
American Red Cross - Wildfire
http://www.redcross.org/services/disaster/0,1082,0_594_,00.html
Teacher Key (PDF)
- Scene 1 Script (PDF)
- Scene 2 Script (PDF)
- Scene 3 Script (PDF)
- Scene 4 Script (PDF)
- Scene 5 Script (PDF)
- Scene 6 Script (PDF)