Fire crews guard giant sequoias against Garnet Fire

FRESNO COUNTY, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) – The Garnet Fire slowed Wednesday night, only growing 209 acres – but even its slow growth is beginning to threaten the giant sequoia trees in the McKinley Grove.

“These trees are extremely important and extremely vulnerable,” Alaina Kuhlman with the Giant Sequoia Lands Coalition said.

Kuhlman has dedicated her career to protecting the ancient trees.

“Both coastal redwood and giant sequoia forests are the two forests in the world that store more carbon per acre than any other forest,” Kuhlman said.

She says about 20% of mature giant sequoias have died since 2015. The Garnet Fire continues to threaten that population.

“There still are a lot of hot spots out there. The large fuels that downed logs, big branches, they’re still very dry,” wildfire spokesperson Joe Zwierzchowski said.

Officials say their primary concerns are for people and towns, but they are also doing everything they can to guard the sequoias.

“We have a sprinkler system around the trees. We’re using the jumpers to go up into the trees when needed to help with the areas that are igniting,” wildfire spokesperson Shannon Colon said.

She says these are much larger than the sprinkler systems in residential lawns.

“The sprinklers are basically set up around the bottom of the root of the tree so that if the fire were to move through that area, it’s going to help to suppress it and push it off the tree. And the ground’s already going to be basically prepped ahead of time,” Colon said.

So far, she says no giant sequoias have caught fire, but flying embers have singed some of their crowns.

“Some embers have lodged up into the branches of some of the sequoias. But no, the trees have not caught fire,” Colon said.

Kuhlman says the sequoias’ crowns are their most vulnerable area. She says their lower trunks are thick and durable, but if their crowns were to fully catch fire, they could die.

Kulhman adds that McKinley Grove has not burned in more than 100 years, leading to high levels of debris on the ground that crews had to quickly clean up before the fire moved in.

“If we were able to do restoration work and clear that forest for debris and do low-intensity burning ahead of a catastrophic wildfire, that wildfire would likely kill less monarch trees,” Kuhlman said.

Officials say they cannot set up sprinkler systems around every tree in the Sierra National Forest, but giant sequoias are not just trees. They are part of the grain of California’s ecosystem.