Homeowners learn merits of fire-resistant plantings
Canyon Country homeowner Jenni Palmer didn’t pause for a moment when asked why she would spend this sunstruck Saturday in a dimly lighted lecture room, learning why rosemary does not belong under the kitchen window in her new herb garden.
“I came because two weeks ago I was preparing to pack up,” she said. That Sunday night, she stood in her frontyard in the Stonecrest neighborhood and watched flames from the fast-moving Buckweed fire light up the eastern sky. She geared up to evacuate, she said. “It was a new experience for me. I’d never before been at risk of losing my home.”
Palmer, 41, did not have to leave after all, and her house is intact.
Still, the lesson stuck.
She was one of 30 Santa Clarita Valley residents who attended a Saturday workshop on fire-resistant landscaping at William S. Hart Park in Newhall, organized by the University of California Cooperative Extension.
They learned why they should consider ripping the climbing ficus from their house walls and uprooting acacia and ice plant, which contains an underlying mat of dead vegetation. They might also cut down what Los Angeles County Fire Department forester Keith Condon called “those horrible, horrible things” known as Italian cypress trees.
The event was planned before at least seven fires ravaged the valley area beginning Oct. 21.
Several homeowners said they showed up because they had almost lost their homes. Some took notes as Condon showed photographs he took last weekend in Malibu during a post-fire inspection to learn why some homes burned and some did not.
Many of the photos showed houses as stately as villas in Tuscany, lavishly landscaped with palms, cypress and ivy. Some were heavily damaged, and Condon explained how poor landscaping choices put them at risk.
“This is bad. Bougainvillea. Acacia. Wood-shake roof,” he said of one home as his students took notes. He moved to the next photo, and the next, explaining how fire traveled through aging ice plant edging and along ivy-covered fencing that acted like wicks to set homes on fire.
The litany of plants included some Southern California gardening classics.
“Oleander. It drops all those leaves down to the base.”
“This was ice plant that burned, leaving the cactus and jade plant.”
“This is one where the ficus caused this house to burn.”
“Dead palm fronds become flaming arrows in fires. With the wind at 80 miles an hour, that’s going to go right through a window, double-pane or not.”
Many of those plants are imports, brought to California as ornamental shrubs and trees, said Sabrina Drill, natural resources advisor with Cooperative Extension. Some, unaccustomed to our hot summers, dry up and become fire hazards, she said. Others, like eucalyptus, contain flammable oil. Some overrun meadows and canyons, crowding out native plants.
Invasive Scotch broom and Spanish broom that cover hillsides with dense growth helped spread the recent Catalina Island fires, she said.
Drill and other speakers urged homeowners close to wild areas to avoid invasive species and to remove flammable vegetation from 100 feet or more around their homes. They should remove dead leaves and other debris promptly.
“Think about maintenance, maintenance, maintenance,” Drill said.
Bill Hickery, 73, who has watched fires burn close to his home, asked about area grasses that turn white and dry in the summer, swiftly transmitting fire.
“Where does all this grass come from, this white stuff?” he asked.
“Unfortunately, one place it comes from is a history of [reseeding with] these grasses after fires for the past 50, 60 years,” Drill said.
Realtor Linda Slocum, who lives near Tesoro del Valle, said she was surprised to learn that acacia can spread fire.
Palmer said she was keenly aware of last month’s wildfires, not only because her home was threatened but because she works with the IBM crisis response team that offered volunteer technical help to fire-ravaged areas.
Soon afterward, she said, her fiance e-mailed her a newspaper announcement about the workshop with a link to the Cooperative Extension site. She registered immediately and came prepared with questions, such as whether her herb garden posed a fire risk. An avid cook, she already has set out mint and basil. Next in line are cilantro and rosemary.
Most herbs are not a hazard, Condon advised.
But rosemary? Not a good idea, he said. Rosemary plants are loaded with flammable oils.
So now Palmer’s rosemary will go in a pot, far away from the house.
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The University of California Cooperative Extension “Safe Landscapes” workshop will be repeated Nov. 17 in Malibu and Dec. 1 in Rolling Hills Estates. More information is at https://celosangeles.ucdavis.edu/ Natural_Resources/Wildland _Fire.htm
