ATTENTION: CULTURAL BURN SCHEDULED FOR TUESDAY JUNE 18 AT JOHNSON RANCH

The City of San Luis Obispo is hosting a cultural burn at Johnson Ranch Open Space conducted by the ytt Northern Chumash Tribe with support from CAL FIRE. You may notice some smoke on June 18th, as well as residual blackened and burned material within the burn unit at Johnson Ranch.

Cultural fire is a form of Traditional Ecological Knowledge that is helping our community adapt to climate change. Traditional Ecological Knowledge represents the learnings gained from Indigenous peoples interactions with plants, animals, and landscapes over thousands of years. 

Tribes throughout California have used fire as an effective and efficient land management tool for over 10,000 years. Indigenous peoples use fire to enhance and maintain biodiversity, increase the abundance of foraged food, encourage the growth of high-quality material, reduce plant diseases and insect infestations, and improve hunting conditions—all while reducing fuels that cause high-intensity catastrophic wildfires. Fire is essential to Indigenous lifeways and native ecosystems. 

Due to climate change, San Luis Obispo is projected to experience more droughts and extreme heat in the near future, which can make grasses and trees more flammable. While fire itself can be dangerous, the primary threat is the over-accumulation of natural fuels including dead and dry grasses, shrubs, and trees. Cultural burning and all forms of intentional fire can reduce the risk of wildfires caused by climate change and over a century of fire suppression and development. 

The City of San Luis Obispo is endeavoring to reintroduce good fire to its open space properties to reduce fuel loads and decrease the likelihood of uncontrolled future wildfires that can lead to significant safety risks, property damage, and air quality impacts on the local community. In addition to reducing wildfire risk, good fire can also regenerate natural ecosystems by reintroducing nutrients to the soil, supporting soil microbes, encouraging new vegetative growth, and increasing carbon sequestration. Good fire is unique because it can help our community adapt to climate change while also increasing the amount of carbon stored in the soil.

Cultural burns are one way San Luis Obispo is reviving Indigenous land tending practices so our open space areas and broader community can buffer the droughts, floods, wildfires, and other hazards of the future.