Canyon No Place to Play With Fire

However clean the air and quiet the nights, life in the hills comes with certain risks. But none is so constant as the threat of wildfires, which can sweep across canyons in minutes and leave behind little but charred earth. The rapacious speed with which the 1993 Calabasas/Malibu brush fire marched from the San Fernando Valley to the Pacific Ocean served as deadly testament to the power of the flames.

That’s why the recent flap in Topanga Canyon over brush clearance is so puzzling. Some residents of the pastoral canyon object to tough new rules that require not only the standard removal of native grass and chaparral but harsh trimming of ornamental landscaping as well. In response to the protests, Los Angeles County firefighters have given canyon dwellers a few extra months--until September--to get their property up to snuff.

The residents have a point. Many have spent years nurturing trees and vines to make their plot of paradise just a little shadier, a little greener. To cut the plants back in the heat of the summer, residents argue, would cause irreparable harm from which they might never recover. It’s an understandable position, but one that’s potentially costly and even deadly.

Some wildfire experts consider ornamental landscaping an even greater threat to homes than the chaparral that serves as the fire’s primary fuel. Why? Because ornamental landscaping is more likely to be tucked up close to the house, where embers can smolder until they ignite. Particularly vulnerable are popular nonnative trees such as the eucalyptus, which can dry out over Southern California’s desiccating summer and then burn more quickly than succulents.

Canyon dwellers know the risks. They’re so real that most insurance companies refuse to write policies on homes in the fire zone, forcing residents to buy coverage from the state’s Fair Plan program. A house with carefully planned landscaping has a considerably higher chance of surviving a wildfire than one on an overgrown lot. For canyon dwellers, clean air and quiet nights are worth the risks. But why add to them? Clear brush early.