Abstract

This Draft Yosemite Fire Management Plan/Environmental Impact Statement documents the analysis of three action alternatives and a no action alternative for a revised Yosemite Fire Management Plan.  Revisions to the fire management program are needed to meet public safety, natural and cultural resource management, and wildland/urban interface protection objectives in Yosemite National Park and the El Portal Administrative Site.  The action alternatives vary in their schedule for completing ecosystem restoration and wildland/urban interface protection work, and in their mix of treatments available to the program for accomplishing work.  The No Action Alternative describes the existing fire management program. The program has been locally effective but has neither been able to restore large areas of the park and administrative site to natural, fire influenced, conditions nor to keep more of the park from needing restoration.  As a result, the incidence of catastrophic fire has increased in recent decades. 

Yosemite National Park occupies 1,170 square miles, or 747,955 acres, on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada of California.  Wildland fire occurred naturally throughout the park, as an important ecosystem process that kept forest fuels and community structure within their natural range of variability.  Past fire suppression activities have led to increases in fuel loads and changes in plant community structure, and to the increasing potential for catastrophic fire.  The Fire Return Interval Departure (FRID) analysis was used in the Draft Yosemite Fire Management Plan/EIS  to estimate the number of “missed” fires for all areas of the park, and to determine which areas are in the greatest need of fire and/or mechanical treatment to restore fuel loads and forest structure.  The analysis concluded that at least 38% of the park and 62% of the administrative site have missed three or more fire return intervals; much of it within upper and lower montane forest communities.  These are mid-elevation forest types, and most of the wildland/urban interface in the park is also located within them.  The risk of catastrophic fire is highest in the areas where fire has been excluded and fuels have built up to hazardous levels.  The treatments proposed in the fire management plan would be guided by restoration and maintenance target conditions, based upon the natural range of variability for park plant communities. 

Comments   This Draft Yosemite Fire Management Plan/Environmental Impact Statement is open to public review and comment for 60 days following the posting of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Notice of Availability, in the Federal Register.  When this filing is made, the closing date for the comment period will be posted on the park website.  Comments should be directed to:

Superintendent, Yosemite National Park

Attn: Fire Management Plan

P.O.  Box 577

Yosemite, CA   95389