Shaped by fire, the Bonanza Creek LTER

Stretching for miles in every direction is dark green forest. Predominantly spruce. Thick and endless. Spruce is primed to burn. And burn it does.

My visit to the Bonanza Creek LTER site is a dramatic reminder that fire controls the landscape here. Smoke is thick nearly every day we're on the ground. The research site focuses intently on fire—how it shapes the landscape, how it affects communities, how it dictates the rhythm of life in boreal Alaska. I set out with a camera and notebook, guided by researchers from the site, to try and capture that dynamic. By the end of the trip, our lungs were full of smoke. My jacket had holes in it from trudging through dense spruce forest. We broke a permafrost coring device—a small causalty in the context of the burned forest. One of the reserachers lost an experiment.

I came away with a newfound respect of the Boreal Forest—how connected the communities are to the landscape, how out of control individuals are in this fire prone ecosystem. I came away with a realization of how fast thigns around here are changing, not just the burning forest but the sinking ground, the expansion of human activities, the reshuffling of the ecosystem in response to global change. And I came away with dozens of photos that capture this experience better than words ever will.

As a reminder, I'm always available for contracted work such as this. Get in touch at the link.

You can read my story, Shaped by fire: The Bonanza Creek LTER at the link, or see the photos below.