VIDEO: As more than half of Maine remains in a severe drought, residents in the coastal town of Castine are taking fire prevention into their own handsโone branch at a time. Witherle Woods, one of the town’s densest forests, is getting some extra attention from volunteers and students. A new partnership between Maine Maritime Academy (MMA) and Maine Coast Heritage Trust (MCHT) is bringing over 150 volunteers together to clear out fire-prone brush and undergrowth.
“We’re seeing the fires in Canada. If you live in Maine, I’m sure you saw smoke somewhere close by you. We’re trying to avoid that here,” MMA senior Patrick McGrath explained. This community effort comes at a time when wildfires are becoming more common across the state due to intense drought and other weather factors. “People think that just because we’re in the Northeast, you don’t need to worry about wildfires,” Forest Ranger specialist Kent Nelson said. “But Maine is the most heavily forested state in the nation, and we have a lot of homes and camps surrounded by those forests.”
Staff with MCHT say these ripe conditions for wildfires are only being exacerbated by climate change. “We’re having more droughts that are more extreme than before so it’s getting drier, there’s more heat to make it dry,” MCHT’s regional stewardship manager Mike Kersula explained. That’s why the students and volunteers are creating what’s known as a “shaded fuel break,” removing low-hanging branches, dead brush, and small trees that could quickly catch and spread flames near homes and public spaces. “You try to remove as much fuel as possible from an area while retaining the crowns of trees so that the forest floor can remain shaded,” Kersula, a conservation worker, said.
This low-tech but effective strategy is one that state forest rangers say could be replicated in any wildfire-prone area, especially in ones that are heavily populated. “Even if it’s something as simple as removing some of the small trees within 30 feet of your home, there are things you can do,” Nelson added. For students like Ethan Rodriguez, a senior at Maine Maritime Academy, the project gives them a chance to make a direct impact on their community while building comradery with his peers.
“It’s just an experience of, โhey, we can work in a team, we can get the job done.โ Here’s what it looks like to have good teamwork and leadership,” Rodriguez said. With every saw stroke and branch tossed onto a pile, they hope to inch closer to a safer forest “A bunch of people live here, we go to school here,” MMA freshman Donovan White added. “So it’s just nice to be able to cut down a whole bunch of stuff that’s not needed.” The Maine Forest Service will later chip the collected brush and spread it along the forest floor, helping reduce future fire risk even more.
