Bob Zybach Feb. 21, 2006 Siskiyou SAF: Ecological Values of Managing Babyfoot lake

Lessons from B&B, Biscuit, & Babyfoot Lake:
Why Wilderness Doesn’t Work in the West

View of Babyfoot Lake from Trail entrance, Kalmiopsis Wilderness, Oregon, September 14, 2005 (photo by B. Zybach, ORWW).

Babyfoot Lake Botanical Area was created in 1963 by the USFS as a preserve for Brewer spruce trees found there. Brewer spruce (Picea breweriana S. Wats)is an unusual, endemic conifer species, scattered in small populations mixed with other conifer species, and restricted to isolated, higher elevation peaks and ridgelines of the Klamath-Siskiyou Mountains in a single 15-mile wide strip from Mt. Shasta, California north to Galice, Oregon. Babyfoot Lake is one of a small number of small lakes in the Klamath-Siskiyou Mountains. It is formed in a glacial cirque, one of several such cirques found scattered throughout the area on the NE aspect of some peaks. The total number of lakes to cirques, spruce to cirques, or spruce to lakes is unknown at this time, but the coincidence of all three, such as this instance, must be highly unusual no matter what the actual correlations may be.

The presence of large patches of bear grass (which is a lily, and not a grass) in the vicinity indicates that the area was likely used on a seasonal basis by local Indian families to harvest food and weaving materials by way of regular tilling and pruning practices. The presence of Brewer spruce indicates that forest fires and broadcast burns were not frequent in the immediate area because of spruce's thin bark and resulting susceptibility to mortality by fire. It is possible, or even likely, that spruce roots were used regularly or on occasion as material for weaving fibers, and that other parts of the plant may have also been used for other purposes, including fuel. Aerial photographs show Babyfoot Lake to be surrounded by rock outcroppings sparsely covered with scattered, low-growing vegetation, an excellent barrier against most surface fires, whether set by people or by lightning.

In 1978, most of Babyfoot Lake Botanical Area was included within the new Kalmiopsis Wilderness boundaries. Conifer seedlings that had begun to invade the area in the 1930s were now beginning to form ladder fuels into the canopies of scattered old-growth groves. Tree counts that had run from five to 15 trees an acre for centuries, were now in the hundreds per acre, and increasing. Lateral growth from these new trees began to stretch across old meadows and rock faces, forming a contiguous blanket of pitchy, volatile fuels over dozens, and hundreds, and thousands of acres at a stretch. In 2002, and despite the protective measures provided by two strongly worded federal regulations, the Kalmiopsis burned a second time, and this time took a number of protected Babyfoot Lake Brewer spruce with it.

Today, the remaining Brewer spruce population at Babyfoot Lake is threatened by the massive build-up of heavy, flammable snags resulting from the recent conifer invasion and subsequent wildfires. When these trees fall they will smash young seedlings and saplings in their way, and can cause considerable damage to even large, established trees by falling or sliding into them. Also, if these fuels are not removed, the next wildfire through here - no matter how few acres - will burn much hotter and closer to the ground due to the new and well seasoned fuels now in place, and additional Brewer spruce mortality is almost guaranteed.

There is a fairly short, pleasant, and well-known trail to Babyfoot Lake. This trail has been made hazardous and unsightly by the existence of thousands of dead, sooty trees. The same is true for traditional camping areas and trails near the lake. I propose that all snags within a tree's length of a Brewer spruce, camping site, or established trail within Babyfoot Lake Botanical Area should be removed ("logged") and used for firewood or some other purpose. Resulting openings can then be maintained as firebreaks and for reintroduction of additional Brewer sprcue trees and their cohorts, by using traditional patch burning, tilling, and pruning practices used locally for thousands of years.

Program Slides	Titles, Summaries, & Related Links	Presentation Files
	Babyfoot Lake Botanical Area: Ecological Values of Active Management. Protection of rare Brewer spruce population can be greatly enhanced by removal of dead trees and invasive weeds. Desired conditions can be maintained with traditional management practices.	JPG
	Endangered Species Habitat: Condors vs. Owls. The California condor is far more endangered and its numbers far smaller than spotted owls. In a choice between the two - all else being equal - it would seem resource managers would favor the more threatened animal. Osborne QTVR files of the Kalmiopsis in the 1930s seems to show a landscape much better suited to condors than owls. Why is the Kalmiopsis not being managed for California condors?
	Historical Babyfoot Lake Aerial Photographs, 1943 to 1979. This series of annotated aerial photographs clearly shows the border of rockface and sparse vegetation that surrounds Babyfoot Lake and has helped safeguard it from wildfire in the past.
	Babyfoot Lake Trail Viewpoint, Sept. 14, 2005. This panoramic sequence clearly shows a surface of the rockface highlighted in the aerial photo collection (above). The Babyfoot Lake logging error can also be seen in this sequence.The ORWW Babyfoot Lake, Oregon website currently has 13 QTVR panoramas of the adjacent Fiddler Mt. Logging Sale and four QTVRs of the Trail and lake itself.	QTVR
	Dr. Zybach on the Babyfoot Lake Trail, Sept. 14, 2005. This video was made during the last week of summer, about one month after the Babyfoot Lake, Oregon logging mistake became known. The message is about the same as this presentation, but was made onsite and has been online more than five months.	MPG
	Babyfoot Lake, Oregon Shoreline, Sept. 14, 2005. This panoramic sequence clearly shows the threat to remaining Brewer spruce trees that is posed by snags rmaining from the Biscuit Fire.	QTVR
	Recommendations: 1) More Research; 2) Better Education	NEXT