New studies show high-intensity fires burn 30 times more acreage today than just four decades ago, often leaving forests unable to return to their pre-wildfire state.
“Wildfire has always been part of western forests,” said Jonathan Coop, professor of environment and sustainability at Western Colorado University. “What’s changing is the pace and impacts of fires. As extreme events become more common in a hotter, drier climate, we can’t count on forests to persist or grow back the way they have in the past.”
Coop worked with researchers from the University of California-Berkeley, Colorado State University and both the U.S. Forest Service and Canadian Forests Service to analyze more than 33,000 wildfires that occurred from 2012 to 2023. Their findings suggest that as conditions become more favorable for fast fire growth, forests may be increasingly pushed toward long-term ecological change rather than recovery.
As of mid-September 2026, more than 56,000 wildfires burned 8.5 million acres of forests and grasslands. They also threatened public safety, triggered evacuations and destroyed homes across multiple states while decimating wildlife and riparian habitat.
New UCLA research found high intensity fires in California are significantly different and much more destructive compared to those in the 1980s and 1990s, which burned mostly at low or moderate severity, benefitting habitat and ecosystems.
“These high-severity, forest-replacing fires used to be uncommon, and now it’s the dominant fire type,” said Park Williams, senior study author and UCLA professor of geography. “Fire is a natural process that can be healthy for ecosystems, but most of California’s tree species have a difficult time coming back following fires that kill huge swaths of trees.”
Researchers pinpoint two causes of the uptick in severe fires. One is dense fuel loads and the other is environmental dryness.
“When the weather is hot and dry, the vapor-pressure deficit is high, which leads the atmosphere to act like a sponge, soaking up surface water. In general, the warmer and drier the atmosphere, the more high-severity fire we saw over the last 40 years,” said Mitchell Hung, UCLA lead author and graduate student.
Thinning, burning do a forest good
Another recent study shows a combination of thinning followed by prescribed burns every four years help ponderosa pine forests better cope with wildfire and drought. In fact, frequent fire is “key to the function of this ecosystem,” according to Andrew J. Sanchez Meador, professor of forest biometrics and quantitate ecology at Northern Arizona University.
“We actually found that both young and old trees responded to the thinning and grew really fast. That’s not a surprise with young trees. When you open up and make resources available, young trees can tend to thrive and jump on that,” Meador told KNAU. “But what we found was trees 500 years old had dramatic increases in growth rates, suggesting that if we treat, both young and old trees can increase their vigor, they can be more resilient to drought, insects and disease. And what we also found was that if we introduce fire into this system, we don’t increase the mortality in that.”
Meador said he understands that people are afraid of fire but counters the best way to address longer burn seasons is to apply frequent prescribed burning on a landscape scale.
About Hunt 2 Conserve
Hunt 2 Conserve is a 501(c)4 nonprofit organization affiliated with the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. Its mission is to advance a legacy of hunting and conservation by educating, activating and developing stewards and defenders of these fundamentally American ideals. For more information, go to hunt2conserve.org.
(Photo source: InciWeb)
