California farms and wildfire

Although wildfires affect farms in the Golden State, farming may keep the flames in check

For this week’s newsletter we reach into our archives. This one was first published in Edible San Diego in summer 2019. It has been updated for a broader readership.

The eight largest wildfires in California have occurred in the last ten years, with three of them occurring in 2018. The Mendocino Fire of 2018, the largest fire in California history, raged for nearly three months and consumed 459,123 acres, ten times the area of Washington DC. Scores of other fires burn in California, and the trend for all of them is to burn larger and hotter.

Scientists have made a connection between our increasing fires and human-induced climate change. Higher temperatures translate into shorter rainy seasons, drier vegetation, and more frequent Santa Anas—the hot, dry, desert winds that fan the flames.

When we see news coverage of wildfires and the damage they bring, television cameras often focus on the ashes and smoke from the remains of houses and neighborhoods. But how do our wildfires affect our California farms? And what is being done for the future?

Preparedness and Research

Most of the farms in San Diego County are in our backcountry or at the interface between the backcountry and urban areas, such as the bucolic fields around Santa Ysabel, about 50 miles east of San Diego. Eric Larson, executive director of the San Diego Farm Bureau, says that during wildfires, resources are correctly concentrated on saving lives, buildings, and homes. “This means that farmers must do what they can to have protections in place before a fire occurs. Those are the typical recommendations for any one: keeping fuel away from structures, perimeter clearing, weed control, and having emergency plans in place,” he says.