Fighting Fire with Fire at Big Cypress National Preserve 

Florida showed off its prescribed burn skills with a big fire at Big Cypress National Preserve in early April. The main goals of the prescribed burn of 12,000 acres are to prevent wildfires, and perhaps even more so, to promote growth of native grasses, said Riki Hoopes, a fire communications specialist with the National Park Service. 

Florida burns more than two million acres each year, as it has for the past several years, in controlled burn programs, making it one of the leading states to implement the practice. 

In Florida, controlled burns are utilized by the National Park Service as well as the state, municipalities, nonprofits, tribes and individual homeowners.

One thing Florida does well is implement more prescribed burns than any other state in the country, said Hoopes. 

 “We do more prescribed burns here than anywhere. There are not many places where you can burn 12,000 acres in a day,” she said. 

In other areas susceptible to wildfire, such as California, hills and mountains create a challenge as fire goes uphill, Hoopes explained. 

These fires in Big Cypress will help to clear out invasive species that are not evolved for regular fires while supporting the native species that have evolved with wildfire, Hoopes said.

Prior to urban development in Florida, fires regularly spread as part of natural land maintenance and Indigenous people used fire as part of their land stewardship to support the health of the ecosystem and their culture. Florida is one of the states that allows the most controlled fire.

The fires do lots of good, said python hunter Anne Gorden-Vega of South Florida.

“Fire gets the invasives out of the way to make room for natives and clears the paths of all wildlife. Mother nature loves a good burn,” added Gorden-Vega, who is a contractor for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

The burn this April would have been canceled or rescheduled if winds were too high and humidity too low to make sure the fire could be contained, said Hoopes. 

This burn includes several segments within the Preserve, including those running along Turner River Road and Wagon Wheel Road. Other areas in Big Cypress National Preserve burned this year are dubbed “Airplane,” “Lost Dog,” and “Kirby” by the Preserve for the purpose of the burns. 

There are at least 12 structures near the early April burn area that the fire crews, who are led by Orlando Genao, the burn boss of Big Cypress National Preserve, are most concerned about protecting, he said.

A burn boss is a requirement in Florida’s prescribed fire and certification system. The specialist receives training on weather and landscape conditions for safe burning and is protected from liability unless there is severe negligence.

In 99.84% percent of the cases, prescribed fires go as planned, according to the U.S. Forest Service. However, in New Mexico in 2022, the Fire Service sparked what became the largest wildfire in the state’s history, igniting more than 340,000 acres of land and destroying hundreds of homes.

At Big Cypress, which is the nation’s first national preserve, a fire won’t be sparked in a high-risk situation such as occurred there, Hoopes said.

There are multiple crews; many come from California and other states participating in the Big Cypress burn, including firing crews that ignite the fire and holding crews that protect the fire’s limits. The fire is spread using ignition by helicopter and on land. 

Out of the 729,000 acres in Big Cypress, roughly 60,000 have prescribed burns. This makes Big Cypress, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary, one of the largest fire management programs in the National Park Service.

Everglades National Park is likely the largest prescribed burn program in the U.S., burning approximately 100,000 acres each year, according to the National Park Service.

Despite this frequency of burns in Florida and in the U.S., there are fewer acres of fire each year now in Florida and throughout most of the U.S. than there were prior to development, officials estimate.

Indigenous people sparked fires as part of land stewardship before laws led to fire suppression. 

Florida’s fire programs help to bring that back closer to balance. 

Fires help to reduce the spread of nonnative species, diminish overgrowth, and allow sunlight to make it to the land, supporting the growth of native grasses and other plants, said Hoopes.

The controlled burn also clears out the fuel of dry brush to minimize wildfire.

By helping native plants thrive, it assists many animals, including gopher tortoises and the 350 species that benefit from their burrows, among others.

Big Cypress National Preserve coordinates with numerous agencies and stakeholders to prevent losses or threats to endangered and threatened species, including the panther, Cape Sable seaside sparrow and others. 

Not only are no endangered or threatened species at risk in the fire in Big Cypress this April, but the fire is to help them, said Hoopes. 

The fire is set in such a way that most animals will be able to move in time despite nesting season, she said. 

This scheduled burn is also surrounded by dirt roads, which are used as natural fire breaks and allow for safe and easy accessibility, she said.

In Fiscal Year 2022-23, the Florida Park Service accomplished 74,202 acres treated by fire. Of that number, 72,739 acres were prescribed fires and 1,463 acres were unplanned ignition or wildfires, officials report.

In an average year, the Florida Forest Service will issue approximately 88,000 controlled fire authorizations, allowing landowners and agencies to prescribe burn more than 2.1 million acres.

Some of the fire will be ignited by torches and others ignited as helicopters drop fireballs that look like ping pong balls with just the right amount of glycol for ignition to occur within 20 to 30 seconds. 

See what’s burning now at https://whyprescribedfire.org/burn-map/.

In other news at Big Cypress National Preserve, as of Tuesday, April 16, at least 18 of the 30 Floridian members of Congress voiced their opposition to the Wilderness Designation that would limit public access to Big Cypress should Congress approve it this summer.