Santa Fe is continually threatened by catastrophic wildfire, particularly in the wildland-urban interface. Local topography and fuels make Santa Fe subject to periodic wildfires. Combined with 100 years of effective fire suppression, these conditions have led to uncharacteristically high fuel loads.
Fuel Load Reduction/Fire Breaks in Wildlands:
Chris’ Tree Service’s fuel management reduces the threat of wildfire on private/ government forestland and shrubland areas. Hazardous fuels are managed through a variety of treatments which remove or modify wildland fuels, thereby reducing the potential for severe wildland fire behavior, lessening the post-fire damage, minimizing soil erosion and the impacts to water quality, enhancing wildlife habitat, and limiting the spread of invasive species and diseases.
Improved health of the land:
Mechanical mastication of fuels is an alternative to the two most common methods of land thinning performed today: piling/contouring/lop, scatter and burning. While these are both good options, and ones we still employ, mastication is often favorable to piling or contouring because it reduces the size of the vegetation by chunking, shredding, and grinding the wood, which then allows it to break down while providing wider ground cover to prevent evaporation and allow for increased soil health under the scatterings.
It’s also often preferred over burning, as is can be performed in nearly any time of year, and the risk of wildfire is much reduced in comparison. Mastication is also an easy way to increases both the unimpeded horizontal distance between healthy trees and the vertical distance between the soil surface and the base of the tree canopy by taking out crowding fuels. Finally, the wide scatter of the wood allows for quick, natural decomposition by increasing the surface area of the vegetation and spreading it to allow maximum contact with the soil surface.
Decreased downsides:
While the advantages of mastication have been known for decades, there have also been significant downsides in the past. Drum mastication, which used to be the standard of care, caused heavy damage to the soil under the area of the masticator. In contrast, our 2018 Caterpillar is equipped with a low-ground-pressure masticator head which uses a rotating cylinder attached with fixed cutting teeth that chew the forest material into mulch, depositing it onto the ground below. The whole machine is rigged on a skid steer with tracks, which is designed to evenly distribute the weight of the machine, causing minimal impact (cited by the company as disturbing the surface less than a human foot).
Chris’ Tree Service can provide information and cost-share assistance for wildfire prevention and recovery strategies regarding fuel hazards, erosion control, soil health, and native plant recovery.