Volume 13 - Issue 3 - Otter Creek Restoration Project - Prescribed Burns for Aspen Regeneration

Aug 26, 2026

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Utah forest news newsletter issue details the Otter Creek Restoration Project led by Bureau of Land Management fire ecologist Brad Jessop during July 2009. The project tests small, carefully planned prescribed burns to remove conifers and stimulate aspen regeneration within “islands” surrounded by sagebrush. It describes crew composition, contingency planning, ignition methods such as drip torches, weather monitoring, and use of a terratorch to increase safety and efficiency. It also covers ecological goals, biodiversity benefits, and long-term monitoring and treatments supported by fencing and research.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryLifestyle

FormatPDF

Pages8

Reading Time12 min

AccessFree to download

Volume 13 Number 3 Summer 2009

Otter Creek Restoration Project

Burn planning and objectives

Test fire, drip torches, and weather monitoring

Terratorch equipment and training

Restoration rationale and long-term plan

Volume 13 Number 3 Summer 2009 Otter Creek Restoration Project When Brad Jessop, Fire Ecologist for the West Desert District of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), called me in the heat of July to let me know he was going to attempt a series of prescribed burns south of Bear Lake the following day, I thought he was a little bit crazy. As it turned out, Jessop had a good plan in place. The goal BLM crews were used to working on desert ﬁres in juniper woodlands, but burning in aspen and conifer forests was new to them. Accordingly, they planned to start small this year, taking on ﬁve different burn units (11 individual stands) with a 40-person crew, several ﬁre engines, and lots of contingency plans. was to burn several“islands” of conifers that had overtaken stands of aspen due to a lack of ﬁre on the landscape. These“islands” of trees were surrounded by a sea of still-green sagebrush, After an exhaustive brieﬁng by the burn boss, the group wisely started by igniting a test ﬁre in the sagebrush outside of the ﬁve-acre patch The Otter Creek Restoration Project aims to promote of trees they intended aspen regeneration by removing conifers. to burn. With a ﬁre which had a high enough moisture content to prevent a ﬁre from spreading. Even though it was the middle of July, Jessop still referred to it as a spring burn, as the conditions that day were pretty spring-like. Jessop assembled 40 or so ﬁreﬁghters and prescribed burn specialists from the West Desert and Green River BLM districts, in addition to crews and personnel from the USDA Forest Service and the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands. The engine standing by, they used drip torches to ignite a representative patch of sagebrush. A drip torch is a canister that contains a continued on next page continued from previous page mix of gasoline and diesel fuel. A wick extends from a tube that comes off the top of the device. When the wick is ignited and the ﬁreﬁghter points it toward the ground, a steady drip of ﬂaming liquid pours from the end, igniting the vegetation beside them as they go. After a few minutes everybody could see that the sagebrush was indeed too green to carry a ﬁre. The sagebrush became in effect their ﬁrebreak for the day, allowing them to aggressively burn the designated areas with little worry of losing control of the ﬁre. Of course, before and during the process, people were assigned to monitor the weather, getting updates from meteorologists in Salt Lake City, and taking hourly weather measurements on-site. typically responds to being burned or cut by sending up suckers that, if protected from grazing, grow to become mature trees. Another goal for the day was to test and train folkson using a fun piece of equipment called the terratorch. This is a truck mounted ﬂame thrower that shoots a stream of burning napalm up to 100 feet into the forest fuels. The terratorch worked very well throughout the day and reduced the number of ﬁreﬁghters needed on the ground. This likely had a positive outcome on the safety of the day, as anytime you can take a few folks out of harm’s way, it is a good thing. The Otter Creek Restoration project was designed in conjunction with the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest, School A terra-torch shoots a stream of burning napalm up to 100 feet into the forest, reducing the number ofﬁreﬁghters needed on the ground. The reason for the burn was almost entirely ecological: to encourage aspen regeneration. These islands of forest appear to have been dominated by aspen historically, but over the past several decades conifer species such as Douglas-ﬁr, subalpine ﬁrand Engelmann spruce have slowly taken over. Research has shown that aspen forests have much greater biodiversity, forage production, and wildﬁre resistance than other forest types. Unfortunately, it also appears that aspen forests have been steadily declining in Utah over the past decades (see “Repeat Photography

FAQs

What was the primary purpose of the Otter Creek Restoration Project?

The project aimed to promote aspen regeneration by removing conifers that had overtaken aspen stands due to lack of fire.

How did crews start the prescribed burns and manage fire control?

They began with a test fire outside the burn patch to ensure the surrounding sagebrush was too green to carry a fire, creating a natural firebreak. Weather was monitored continuously with onsite measurements.

What role did the terratorch play during the burn effort?

The terratorch, a truck-mounted flame thrower, projected burning fuel up to about 100 feet, working well throughout the day and reducing the number of ground firefighters needed.

Aug 26, 2026

Upload by Quinn