Why are small forest fires good?

Answer 1

Small wildfires have numerous benefits. One is that a series of small fires over a long period of time prevents a devastating large wildfire from occurring. One of the reasons we have a lot of damaging large wildfires today is because for most of the last century, the school of thought was to immediately put out any forest fires. Suppressing natural fires for long can cause just one devastating fire to build up.

Wildfires convert old growth forests into newer growth. Old growth coniferous forests have a thick canopy and little sunlight reaches the forest floor. With little sunlight hitting the forest floor, not many plants can survive there. Consequently there is little food for animals to eat, and relatively few animals live in such an environment. A fire breaks down the canopy and allows the sunlight through, and new growth of numerous plants that could not survive in the shade grow in the sunny environment. Those plants attract animals that feed on them. New growth starts emerging within a couple days after a fire. A month after a fire in a place like a grassland, almost all organic material is new living biomass as opposed to detritus.

There are also plants that are adapted and even depend on periodic fires. This type of natural disturbance to an ecosystem is essential to the savanna and chaparral biomes. Some plants' seeds will only germinate after a hot fire, and fire-resistant roots will allow them to sprout quickly while using nutrients released during the fire. Fire-adapted plants can reach extinction with humans suppressing periodic fires, usually caused by lightning-- that is until an uncontrollable forest fire develops.

It is important to recognize that a forest fire does not consume the trees; the outside burns, but the dead wood is left standing there for sometimes decades. These dead trees provide excellent food source for certain insects (and the animals that eat them), and great habitat for small mammals and birds. Some animals actually favor freshly-burned areas. Black-backed woodpeckers only live in freshly burned stands of trees, for example.

Answer 2

It can burn away dead things and allow for healthier regrowth