PRINEVILLE, Ore. – Fire managers
on the Ochoco National Forest plan to take advantage of favorable weather on
Monday to ignite another prescribed burn, the location of which depends on the
amount of precipitation that arrives this weekend.
Predictions call for varying amounts of rain in
the Ochocos this weekend. If conditions are dry enough on Monday, fire managers
will pursue the Spears 1 prescribed burn near Spears Meadow, just west of
Highway 26 and east of Rocky Butte along Forest Road 3300500, about 17 miles
east of Prineville.
The Spears 1 burn unit is about 1,200 acres and
will be accomplished over several days. Smoke is expected to drift north into
Mill Creek Valley, but signs will be placed along Highway 26. There are no road
closures expected.
An attempted prescribed burn near Spears Meadow
earlier this week was too wet to burn with desired intensity and that burn is
now in patrol status.
If conditions near Spears Meadow remain too wet
to burn on Monday, fire managers will pursue the Upper Beaver prescribed burn
unit. That burn unit is approximately 1,000 acres located immediately south of
Black Canyon Wilderness and just west of Mud Springs campground.
Firefighters successfully burned this week within
the Willow Pine burn units located on the drier eastern side of the National
Forest, about five miles south of Frazier campground near Porcupine and
Sunflower creeks.
Objectives for both the Spears 1 and Upper Beaver
prescribed burns include improvement of wildlife habitat and range conditions,
and removing hazardous fuels to reduce the future potential for high-intensity
wildfire.
All prescribed burning is proposed, analyzed,
and planned ahead of time by the Forest Service as part of restoration and
fuels management projects. Fuels specialists follow policies outlined in the
Oregon Smoke Management Plan, which governs prescribed fires (including pile
burning) and attempts to minimize impacts to visibility and public health.
For more information, visit the Ochoco
National Forest website at www.fs.usda.gov/ochoco and
follow us on Twitter @CentralORFire, or visit our interactive prescribed fire
map online at http://go.usa.gov/3hkwJ
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