“To help us help the forest.”

“First of mind is what happened in Texas last week—and the speed at which that grass fire got really big and dangerous,” New Mexico State Forester Laura McCarthy said in the NMPBS studio last week. “There are parts of New Mexico right now where that kind of fire could have happened here. And on a Red Flag Day like the day when that fire took off, we could have experienced that same fire behavior.” 

She added, “At the same time, there are also other parts of the state, especially the northern mountains, that have a pretty high snow pack, more than average, and while that’s great, we also know that with climate change and the warming temperatures, that snow is going to disappear a lot faster than it used to.”

On last week’s show, New Mexico State Forester Laura McCarthy and Deputy State Forester Lindsey Quam spoke about the 2024 fire season, prescribed fire, what foresters have learned from the 2022 Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire, protecting your community from wildfire, and more. 

Historically, fire was vital to the structure and composition of western forests, Quam said during the interview.

“It’s because of taking that vital piece out [that] we have the conditions that we’re facing right now and why our forests aren’t healthy. When you take a vital piece out of any component it’s not going to operate properly and you have cascading effects,” he said.

“And that’s what we’re dealing with right now: We’re dealing with about 100-plus years of fire suppression and removing fire out of that essential system. Forests don’t know how to adapt to it, and so we’re forced with having to help manage that adaptation [through prescribed fire]. We need to include that vital piece to help us help the forest.”

If you’d like to learn more about some of the things we talked about:

• Fire Prevention (including a guide for homeowners and information about how to prepare for evacuation) 

• Information on working as a wildland firefighter for New Mexico State Forestry

• Insurance companies pulling out on homeowners

• Indigenous Peoples Burning Network 

Some of the news:

• “NM AG agrees with law firms’ argument seeking more funds for Hermits Peak-Calf Canyon Fire victims” (Patrick Lohmann, Source New Mexico)

• “PRC denies application for Rio Rancho liquified natural gas facility” (Danielle Prokop, Source New Mexico)

• “Business leaders disappointed with LNG rejection” (Megan Gleason, Albuquerque Journal)

• “PNM rate case heads to state Supreme Court as utility, advocacy group both appeal” (Nicolas Gilmore, Santa Fe New Mexican)

• “Make your voice heard: Public meeting Wednesday to hear what people think is best for Bosque parcel” (Alaina Mencinger, Albuquerque Journal)

• “A deep guide to people and terms in the Rio Grande SCOTUS case” (Danielle Prokop, Source New Mexico)

• “What to expect from the Rio Grande SCOTUS oral arguments” (Danielle Prokop, Source New Mexico)

• “’It Feels Impossible to Stay’: The U.S. Needs Wildland Firefighters More Than Ever, but the Federal Government Is Losing Them” (Abe Streep, ProPublica)

• “Why is the Sea So Hot?” (Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker)

The Los Alamos Study Group and Nuclear Watch New Mexico both sent press releases out last week, noting that the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has asked Congress for its “biggest nuclear weapons budget ever.” The agency’s total Fiscal Year 2025 request for nuclear weapons is $19.8 billion; that’s $700 million more than what Congress allocated the agency in FY 2024 and “a full billion dollars above what President Biden asked for last year,” according to Nuclear Watch New Mexico.

Meanwhile, U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) funding for cleanup isn’t growing commensurately. In an email, the Los Alamos Study Group’s Greg Mello notes: “DOE’s Defense Environmental Cleanup budget would remain about flat in DOE’s budget (DOE summary, p. 1; Environmental Management budget details). In other words, DOE’s cleanup budget will fall in real terms unless Congress adds more funding, as lawmakers have done in similar situations before. At Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) the cut in cleanup is particularly steep, a proposed 15%.”

“[T]o help us help the forest.”

I’ve been thinking about that a lot since Quam said it last week. 

Over the weekend, Albuquerque experienced on-and-off rains that were gentle and kind and nourishing. (As opposed to rains that can be hard and fast and which don’t have the chance to soak into the soil, but often run off too quickly.) Already, the mustards and dead nettles are going nuts in my neighborhood (along with the poppies and tulips and daffodils and fruit trees). And I can just feel the collective need my neighbors and the city will act on to pull and spray and kill whatever “weeds” they can.  

I know that weeds, invasives, and non-native plants are complicated—and different people have different ideas about them. I’m not discounting those valuable discussions. But I do wish, for example, that rather than scrambling to spray chemicals on mustard greens, we’d let their yellow blossoms greet bees and other pollinators, allow their roots to break up and build soil. I’m often amazed at how inhospitable we make our yards and neighborhoods for plant and animal life. I’m not just talking about concrete cities, busy highways, and infrastructure that’s unfriendly to people, too—but of how often we neglect to perform even small acts that help us help our own ecosystem. 

If you want hints on how to make your yard and neighborhood a friendly place for the creatures and plants we share the world with, a few good places to look include the ABQ Backyard Refuge Program and Xerces Society.

I’m sad to hear that Lorenzo Candelaria died recently. The Our Land crew met Candelaria at his South Valley farm in 2018 while taping a segment about Albuquerque’s Project Feed the Hood. Here, he’s pictured with Travis McKenzie, one of the co-founders of Project Feed the Hood.

“We plant many plants on this farm, but we harvest only one thing,” Candelaria told us that day. “That one thing is consciousness, the ability to understand that connection to this mother that we call Earth.” 

So many people learned from Candelaria over his long lifetime, and I’m very thankful to have sat under the cottonwood on his 300-year- old farm in the South Valley, tasted some of the sweet raspberries he grew, and learned from his lifetime of loving the land, too. 

Lastly, enjoy this lovely piece from Ruxandra Guidi, “Listen to the Earth breathing.”

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