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Sat. Aug 21st 2010 Horse Mt. lVolunteer Fire Dept. "Open House" 8/21/2010  HORSE MT. VOLUNTEER
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CWPP - Wild Horse Print this page
The Wild Horse Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) is a supplement to the Catron County Community Wildfire Protection Plan. The County CWPP completed in October, 2005 assesses the wildfire threat and hazardous fuels treatment priorities on a landscape scale. The Wild Horse CWPP uses the data and findings of the County CWPP to assess the wildfire threat and treatment priorities specific to the Wild Horse Wildland Urban Interface (WUI #s 88, 89,100, 115-117). Mitigation which will reduce the threat of wildfire damage to property, life and the land are proposed. Project scale data from the County CWPP and other sources is presented to aid in planning and design of the proposed projects. A CWPP for the Wild Horse subdivision only was completed in 2005 by the BLM in cooperation with the Wild Horse Landowner's Association. It is the intent of this plan to incorporate the results of the good work on public involvement and needs assessment so that it is in the context of the larger effort in the County.
The Wild Horse WUI #s 88, 89,100, 115-117 includes 41,823 acres, 88% of which is in WUI areas 89 and 115. The remaining WUIs are scattered around these two WUI areas and would not be included in a plan such as this except for their being near to other major WUI areas. Bureau of Land Management and private land is included within the boundaries. There are 34 E911 address sites recorded for this WUI which includes private homes and businesses and miscellaneous buildings. The largest WUI, 115, is the Wild Horse subdivision rated 52th in priority for treatment out of the 196 WUI areas in the County. The other six WUI areas in this plan rated 115th, 81st, 180th, 96th, and 193rd respectively. The rating is especially lower than reality for WUI 115 as will be discussed below.
The County CWPP contains a thorough presentation of how determinations of values at risk, risk of occurrence and fire threat were used to locate the areas and values most at risk from catastrophic wildfire in the County and to prioritize treatment needs. Please refer to the County CWPP for more information. It is not the intent of this plan to duplicate the County CWPP. The general outline of the County CWPP is followed in this CWPP, except where there is no supplement necessary to the County CWPP. Also see the BLM 2005 Wild Horse Community Protection Plan for information.
Goals And Objectives
As a supplement to the County CWPP, the main objective of the Wild Horse CWPP is to propose work needed to reduce and mitigate fire threat. To accomplish this objective this supplement continues the collaboration started in the County CWPP, coordinating the needed work with past efforts, the various land owners and other interest.
The desired condition for WUI areas as stated in the County CWPP is obtainable: "The desired condition for WUI areas is a fire safe environment around protected improvements that will provide "defensible space" for firefighters in the event of a wildfire in the surrounding area". There is some high fuel loading, but not as many complicating factors such as high elevation forests on steep slopes, Wilderness and Roadless Study areas and environmental concerns such as the Mexican spotted owl as there are in some of the WUI areas in the County. There is an excellent opportunity to obtain the desired condition for this WUI area.
No modifications were made in the WUI boundaries as established in the County CWPP.
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Until the last 10-15 years, this area of the County was open rangeland and forests with only a few scattered ranch houses and facilities. There are large tracts of private land that originally were on large ranches. Past timber and wood cutting, cattle grazing and fire exclusion has influenced the species composition and structure of vegetation in the area.
Water availability for fire fighting is generally not very good for these WUI areas.
Except for the steeper inaccessible areas, most ponderosa pine areas have been commercially harvested in the past for mining timbers, railroad ties and lumber. There have been numerous non-commercial treatments also such as pre-commercial thinning and prescribed burns. Fire wood cutting has greatly altered the age class and species composition in areas accessible to wood cutters. Also see the BLM 2005 Wild Horse Community Protection Plan for more information on history of the Wild Horse area.
Besides the meetings held around the County and at the Wild Horse Fire Station for the County Wildfire Protection Plan, there were several meetings by the BLM Albuquerque Field Office at the Wild Horse Fire Dept. The BLM Albuquerque Office has had extensive contact with many of the private land owners and the Wild Horse Fire Dept. concerning treatment needs and proposed projects. Also see the BLM 2003 Wild Horse Community Protection Plan for more information on the collaboration done for that CWPP. Comments from all these meetings and contacts were incorporated in a rough draft. The rough draft was presented at public meeting on May 25, 2007 at the Wild Horse VFD. Comments on the rough draft were incorporated in a draft which was sent out for a last review by the involved agencies before the final was signed.
Most of the data used for this CWPP is from the County CWPP and was scaled to fit these WUIs, Although the County CWPP was a landscape scale analysis, much of the data originated at a scale that fits the purpose of this CWPP (30x30 meter satellite imagery for example).
See Collaboration section above.
The Wild Horse CWPP includes WUI areas around 9 subdivisions: Ponderosa Vista, Pinon Valley Estates, Antelope Hills, Folsum Ridge and 5 phases in Wild Horse. The community of Pie Town lies about 10 miles to the southwest of the southwest corner of these WUIs. Access to the area is best over U.S. Highway 60 to County Rd. 603 out of Pie Town. Most of the land is privately owned(75%). These WUI areas are within theAlbuquerque Field Office of BLM.
Elevation ranges from 8000 ft. on the east side to 7500 ft. on the west side. Most of the area is grassland or pinon/juniper but there is some ponderosa pine, especially in the east half of the Wild Horse subdivisions. As can be seen in the table below almost 4,000 acresof the forested areas arein a "closed" canopy condition.
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| Healthy Forests |
"Communities for Healthy Forests" Mission Statement: Communities for Healthy Forests was founded to inform the public, natural resource managers and policy makers about catastrophic stand clearing events in public forests caused by fire, and other natural disasters. Communities for Healthy Forests exists to illustrate and explain the benefits of applying the best scientifically supported prescriptions for restoring health to overgrown forests and to rehabilitate severely damaged forests promptly following such events. For more information, see link below: www.communitiesforhealthyforests.org
"The Forest Factor": the factor in the carbon cycle, climate change, and our community. |
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