Local News in Brief : Fire Crews to Clear Brush
Los Angeles County Fire Department crews will begin clearing heavy brush from a Santa Clarita hillside next week as the first step in testing a new wildfire prevention technique that includes re-establishing native oaks on the site.
Instead of simply burning off highly combustible material, firefighters will remove dead brush and other chaparral plants and replace them with oak trees grown at the department’s nursery in Bouquet Canyon.
In the past, controlled burns have been one of the department’s chief weapons in preventing disastrous brush fires.
“This is a demonstration project that, to my knowledge, no government agency has ever done before,” said Capt. Scott Franklin, the Fire Department’s vegetation management coordinator. “If we’re successful, and we’ll know that within two years, we’ll expand this project all over the county.”
“We know it will work,” he said. “Oaks are highly fire resistant. The only time they’ll burn is when they have fuel beneath them.”
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