Recovery & Resources / AN ORANGE COUNTY GUIDE TO COPING WITH FIRE : Precautions for Protecting Houses From Fire

Fire can devastate anywhere, but you can help protect your home by limiting the materials around it that can fuel the flames.

Things to do right away:

* Clear brush away from your house. This means cutting back tall grass and weeds, getting rid of piles of dead leaves and eliminating tree branches that overhang the roof. Trees and other plants that climb to roof height can create a perfect ladder for fire to climb from ground level. Also, just because vegetation is green doesn’t mean it won’t burn. If the fire gets hot enough, it’ll burn just about anything.

* Get rid of other combustibles. Oily rags, piles of newspaper, trash, gas cans and the like. These pose a fire hazard any time, but when the Santa Anas appear, the air dries out and the temperature rises, so does the potential for disaster from carelessly placed fuel.

* Keep a fire extinguisher handy. But don’t expect to fight a large fire with it. Kitchen fires, trash can fires, yes. But if the fire’s large enough to truly frighten you, shut the door on it and call 911.

For the long term:

* Consider something other than a shake shingle roof. Stories of these roofs being ignited by sparks from a fire miles away are common. Shake material that has been pressure-treated with fire-retardant chemicals is available, and untreated roofs can be sprayed with fire retardant. However, there is great divergence of opinion on the effectiveness of pre-treated and sprayed shake roofs. Fire officials overwhelmingly prefer roofs made from other non-flammable materials, such as clay or tile.

* Plant fire-retardant, drought-resistant plants around your house. Plants with high moisture content are best. For instance, sea fig, which is commonly planted along freeways, has a 60% moisture content. Other desirable plants include the strawberry tree, carob tree, pineapple guava, New Zealand Christmas tree, pomegranate, oak, Brazilian pepper, oleander, cape honeysuckle, dwarf coyote bush and many ice plants and other succulents.

Other plants, however, contain a high oil content, which causes them to explode when fire hits them, sending hot embers flying. They are particularly susceptible in hot weather when they sweat and emit ether. They include eucalyptus, juniper, sumac, some pines, cedar cypress, chamise, red shanks, California sagebrush, common buckwheat, black sage, hopseed bush and fountain grass.

Celia Kutcher, arboretum curator and taxonomist at Cal State Fullerton, said California native plants pose a real dilemma. People should use drought-tolerant plants to save water, but they have to be careful because of the fire potential. In fact, some have their life cycles geared to fire, expecting to burn and to sprout again after fires or to have their seeds germinated by the heat of the flames, she said.

She advises against planting eucalyptus, sumac and California natives, and plantings should not be near to the home.

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Contributing to this story were Patrick Mott and Robert Barker.