Idaho's 2008 wildfire season nearly became the fire season that wasn't.
In all, just 901 wildfires spanning a total of 98,894 acres have burned across the state this year due to natural and human-caused ignitions, information from the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise indicates. That figure doesn't account for an additional 35 remote, natural-caused wildfires that state fire managers this year allowed to burn 47,189 acres for resource objectives.
It's a far cry from a year ago, which was one of the busiest wildfire seasons in Idaho and the surrounding northern Rocky Mountain region in many years. According to the fire center, 1,473 wildfires combined to burn almost 2 million acres throughout Idaho's backcountry in 2007. State fire managers allowed another 73 remote, natural-caused wildfires to burn almost 200,000 acres for resource objectives in 2007.
Nationwide, the difference between the 2008 and 2007 wildfire acreage numbers is just about as compelling. To date, a total of 70,520 wildfires spanning almost 5 million acres have burned in the United States this year, the fire center reports. That compares to 74,031 wildfires spanning over 8 million acres nationwide in 2007.
In 2006, the number of wildfires nationwide was even greater, at 84,480 individual fires spanning an astounding 9 million acres, the highest acreage since the turn of the century. The nationwide 10-year average since 1999 has been 69,117 fires and a total of over 6 million acres burned.
If things stand as they are now, the nationwide figures will mark the 2008 wildfire season as the third lowest in terms of total acreage burned since 2000. According to the fire center, just five wildfires spanning 108,088 acres continue to burn across the nation. Two of those are in California, two in Oregon and one in Kentucky.
Locally, the wildfire picture has been much the same this year, said Bill Murphy, fire management officer for the Ketchum Ranger District and Sawtooth National Recreation Area.
On the more than 1 million acres he oversees in these two areas, Murphy saw a significant downturn in the number of wildfire starts this summer. That followed a significant increase in the number of large fires he saw during the 2005-2007 wildfire seasons.
In all, just 12 wildfires spanning a total of 560 acres have burned in the SNRA and Ketchum District this year, Murphy reported. The 12 fires were split in half in terms of how they ignited, with six started by humans and the remaining six begun by lightning strikes.
"Most of them were small," he said.
Last year in the local area, 22 wildfires—about average—combined to burn over 50,000 acres, Murphy said. Of course, that figure includes the massive Castle Rock Fire, which burned 48,520 acres during 20 long days last summer.
"It was a very busy year," he said.
However, even in the two years before that, the number of acres burned on the Sawtooth's north zone was up.
In 2005 it was the 40,000-acre Valley Road Fire in the White Cloud Mountains. The next year it was the 4,000-acre Trailhead Fire in the northern Sawtooth Mountains. And then the Castle Rock Fire. Altogether, the three large fires plus 61 small blazes burned 94,983 acres during those three years.
That number looks most significant when viewed against how many burned in the same area during the previous nine years—just 5,343 acres between 1996 and 2004.
Idaho benefited from a number of things this summer, Murphy said. First, there was the cool, wet spring. After that, the number of natural-caused wildfires due to lightning also dropped.
This year in July, the Sawtooth north zone saw just four days with lightning activity, Murphy said. That compares to 11 days of lightning activity in the area in July 2007 and 10 days in July 2006.
Murphy's also seen evidence to suggest Idahoans were on their best behavior this summer.
"I think the public was more cautious," he said. "The state had a few less human (caused) fires."
Outside of the Sawtooth, several wildfires did burn on U.S. Bureau of Land Management land in Blaine County this summer, including the almost 15,000-acre blaze that threatened The Nature Conservancy's 883-acre Silver Creek Preserve in the Bellevue Triangle on the south end of the Wood River Valley.
So, what will happen next summer? It will depend on the kind of winter and spring the area sees, Murphy said.
"I'm not making any predictions," he said.
A P2V Neptune drops a load of retardant on the fast-moving “Nature Fire” near Picabo and Silver Creek in August. The fire burned 14,874 acres before firefighters brought it under control on Aug. 29. Photo by David N. Seelig
