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Post-Fire Land Care
It’s happened. The special place where you have invested time, care, and labor has burned in a wildfire. Now what?
Wildfire severity can vary widely, even over small areas of burned land. Virtually all the vegetation communities in Sonoma County–their animals, soil organisms, and plants–evolved with fire over millennia, and have impressive capacities to cope with fire and even thrive after it. However, on land that hasn’t been managed with fire in mind, fire severity can be extreme on steep slopes, in dense vegetation, or where the fire was driven by high winds.
Photo: Sonoma Ecology Center.
These informational resources can help guide you after a wildfire.
- California Native Plant Society Fire Recovery Guide. This page also links to in-depth articles about the role of fire in California’s native plant communities in the past, present, and future.
- Sonoma Valley & North Bay Fire Recovery, from Sonoma Ecology Center, covers caring for burned trees, helping wildlife after fire, keeping toxic ash from reaching streams, erosion repair, and why you probably don’t want to attempt re-seeding.
- Scroll down to “Fire Recovery downloadable resources” on Sonoma RCD’s Fire Mitigation and Post-Fire Recovery page.