Ashe Junipers (aka Mountain Cedars), represent another problem to the central Texas landscape. They are a serious fire hazard. Many folks, who deem cedars as ornamental. probably do not take the fire threat as a major issue. Let me assure you that our fire control professionals do consider it as a major problem.

The following letter to our web site is an articulate statement about fire hazards, one communities approach to alleviate the forest fire threat, and other interesting points:

Dear Sirs;

I applaud your efforts with your web site. As a practicing arborist in Central Texas for the last 27 years (and a life long resident), I have seen the damage being done so insidiously by both the ash junipers and the environmentalists.

Some points you should make clear in your web site are:

1) Ashe juniper is a tremendous fire hazard. Forest fire experts have visited Austin and as one remarked, " It looks like Oakland before the fire."

Austin is set up to have a catastrophic forest fire that may rival Oakland's fire of the early 90's. It would probably happen during a hot dry August with a wind off the desert southwest during a prolonged drought so typical in Austin. A careless cigarette tossed out on Loop 360 will burn Westlake until it hits Lake Austin.

When this prospect was presented to Westlake City Council recently, they relaxed their absolute ban of cutting any trees to allow for ash juniper to cut 30 feet from a house to create a "defensible space" around the house. (This is still not enough!) Westlake has many similarities to Oakland - a) trees going up against houses, b) very narrow streets, c) low water pressure at the end of the those streets, & d) many houses sheathed in wood (cedar siding!)

2) The wildfire danger is one everyone should to be concerned about, not just Westlake. A piece of dry cedar burns like a kerosene torch while a piece of green cedar will burn like a gasoline torch! All over western Travis County, ash juniper presents a true fire hazard.

3) Birds vs People - It should be made very clear that the birds thought to need cedars a) don't feed on the trees but simply make nests using strips of bark and b) while Central Texas is suffering with cedar fever, the birds the environmentalists are "protecting" are spending the winter in Mexico!

4) Allopathic effect - Cedars, either through their roots or leached from the organic matter constantly falling from them, inhibit the growth of other plants chemically. This is known as allelopathy. Very few plants have adapted to grow in the vicinity of cedars - live oaks (Quercus fusiformis) red oaks (Quercus texana) agarita, Texas persimmon, yaupon, green briar, silk tassel, evergreen sumac, yucca, pear cactus. As the cedars get a foot hold, even these few plants eventually lose out to the ubiquitous weed called "cedar."

This significantly limited pallet of plants diminishes us all. Mr. Bamberger's ranch is such a great example of the diversity of plant and wildlife following the eradication of cedars that you need to emphasize his success more on your web page.

5) More emphasis should be put on the fact that when traveling west of Austin, one doesn't run out of "cedars" until they get into Eastern Arizona! There is no shortage of ashe juniper!

6) If any other pollutant occurred 25% of the year and made 25% of the population sick, there would be legislation banning it!

Let me know what I can do to help. I encourage my clients to cut cedars down almost daily.

Sincerely;

Patrick Wentworth
ISA Certified Arborist #TX-0119
ISA Texas Chapter's Arborist of the Year 1999
ISA Texas Chapter's Arborist of the Year 2002
 

City of Austin Wildfire Hazard

To further impress people who live in areas with large mountain cedar populations, the City of Austin has information on their Office of Emergency Management regarding this subject. You can view this information at this web address: http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/disasterready/aboutwildfire.htm . This site has good information on how to take steps to reduce the threat from wild fire hazards. Of course in the Austin area, the mountain cedar is a prime candidate for contributing to wild fires.