This month on Lighting a Match, Caleb Goldsmith walks us through a prescribed burn prep on a private property that has a healthy Gopher Tortoise population. The Orianne Society burn team is working to clear 20-year-old growth turkey oak here to open up the canopy and restore wiregrass growth on this longleaf sandhill.
In the southeastern U.S., managing the small fragments of remaining longleaf pine forest requires extensive efforts to simulate natural disturbances that historically occurred through regular wildfires. Managers most frequently manage longleaf pine systems with the application of prescribed fire, but there are a variety of other management techniques that can also be applied in these systems.
This month on Lighting a Match, Caleb walks us through an overgrown and fire-suppressed area at The Orianne Society’s Longleaf Stewardship Center that has been clear cut, leaving little islands around the Gopher Tortoise burrows, and prepared for planting.