| Two stories Local Park Continues To Rebuild After Cedar Fire 2003 Fire Destroyed Much Of Cuyamaca Rancho State Park POSTED: 4:06 pm PDT October 26, 2010 SAN DIEGO -- Seven years ago this week, the Cedar Fire killed 15 people, burned 2,800 buildings (including 2500 of our homes) and also devastated Cuyamaca Rancho State Park, a popular spot for campers and hikers about 40 miles east of San Diego. "It was very emotional," said retired Park District Superintendent Mike Wells. "It felt like getting kicked in the stomach." The fire destroyed 90 percent of the pine trees in the 25,000-acre park "It made you cry," said current Park Superintendent Nedra Martinez. "It literally brought tears to your eyes to see the place you love so much look the way it does." But now, very slowly, the park is coming back. There is a 10-year plan to plant 800,000 pine and cedar trees. The trees being planted now are just a few inches tall, but in 10 years they could grow to 20 feet. The planting is necessary because most of the trees left after the fire will eventually fall down and will not grow back on their own. "The fire was just so intense," said Wells, who is supervising the reforestation effort. "It covered such a large area that there are very few patches of trees left to disperse seeds and start a new forest." Last year, 78,000 trees were planted, and 81,000 more will be planted this year. The effort is expected to take a long time to complete. "It's really hard for people to understand that because we think in a very small time period. Two or three years for us is a long time. Mother Nature thinks in centuries," said Martinez. Wells estimated the park will take decades or even a century to look the way it did before the fire. Some of the trees that burned were 400 to 500 years old. Some of the trees planted three years ago are now three-feet tall, and that progress has is encouraging to Martinez. "When my great-grandchildren see it, it will look much like I knew it when I was a kid," said Martinez. A number of corporations have made contributions to help in the re-planting effort, but more contributions are still needed. AND Mystery of the dying seedlings in the Cuyamaca forest Efforts to reforest Cedar fire-ravaged state park hindered by bad soil, drought, staffing By Lily Leung Tuesday, October 26, 2010 at 8:41 p.m. CUYAMACA RANCHO STATE PARK — State forester David Janssen stood among naked cedars and pines, surveying the charred leftovers of a vicious wildfire. The trees were expected to grow back after the state's largest wildfire destroyed most of Cuyamaca Rancho State Park in 2003. That regrowth never came. "What seeds were down on the ground were cooked," Janssen said. Foresters have taken on the role of Mother Nature by planting hundreds of thousands of seedlings here and in other county forests. But many seedlings are dying, a mystery that foresters are scrambling to solve because wildfires are expected to gradually worsen in frequency and severity across the West. Fewer trees mean less air pollution is absorbed. Before the Cedar fire seven years ago, Cuyamaca Rancho was the largest storage of carbon dioxide in this region. Fewer trees also mean increasing erosion and the loss of natural habitat for a variety of wildlife. Janssen and his colleagues continue looking for clues on how to restore the life of a once-verdant forest. "People ask me, 'Aren't you a little disappointed on how many die?' " said Janssen, who works for Cal Fire, the state's fire and forestry agency. "I don't look at the death. I look to survival." Reforestation by humans has existed for decades, but the type occurring in Cuyamaca Rancho is new. Foresters never have had to restock so many acres of land or deal with soil so badly burned that it's no longer conducive to growing native trees. In the past three years, work crews have planted about 170,000 seedlings at Cuyamaca Rancho. Survival rates in most areas range from 20 percent to 40 percent. The industry ideal is 50 percent. Challenges have included record-breaking drought, nonnative vegetation crowding the seedlings and limited staffing to help manage the reforestation process. The latest threat is the potential closure of the last state-run nursery, a top source of seedlings to Cuyamaca Rancho. The Magalia Reforestation Center in Butte County is expected to close by March 1 because of the ongoing state budget deficit. State foresters plan to buy their seedlings from California's federal nursery, although they're unsure if that facility can handle the added load. The alternative is buying from commercial nurseries, but because they're all in Northern California, foresters are bracing for high transportation costs. That poses a problem for government agencies that have little or no money to restock their forests. Volcan Mountain, which was hit by the Cedar fire, has no reforesting funds for 2011. Officials with the Cleveland National Forest said they can't afford to restore every acre burned in recent wildfires because of their limited reforesting budget, which relies mainly on donations, said Cleveland ecosystem officer Gloria Silva. The reforestation of Cuyamaca Rancho State Park and other areas torched by the Cedar fire has been a process of trial and error. To save money, foresters used inmates to plant seedlings. That didn't work because the untrained labor likely led to high mortality rates for the plantings. Foresters now hire professional crews. Rangers also learned that thorough prep work, from clearing brush to doing controlled burns, is key to increasing survival rates that can reach as high as 70 percent. "We're trying things and hopefully repeating those things that have worked," said Mike Wells, who oversees the reforesting project at Cuyamaca Rancho. State fire officials recently hired a university researcher to determine if clearing a certain kind of brush, called ceanothus, would negatively affect the survival rates of seedlings planted in the vicinity. The theory is that ceanothus releases nitrogen into the soil, which can benefit nearby trees. Foresters also are studying Cuyamaca's fire history. While ambling through the woods on a recent day, Janssen pointed to burned trees with wedges cut out for analysis. The goal is to confirm wildfire frequency to help with preparedness. lily.leung@uniontrib.com (619) 293-1719 • Twitter @lilyshumleung | 
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