 There's no one right way to manage a forest that's for sure, but across the state a lot needs to be done You know the lack of forest management coupled with a changing climate has really brought us to a point in California Where if we don't make a change, I would say that the majority of our you know our forest lands are at risk now We're here at Blodgett Forest, which is one of the Berkeley Forest research properties One of our main objectives here is to take the research that we learn and actually implement here and demonstrate it and Outreach the public with it So today we're here with a group of journalists letting them see the different forest management alternatives and research projects that we've been working on recently The fire hazard is is high here There are other areas that are actually worse than this because of management activity and we're going to show you that Our forests are not in very good shape And I think the last couple of fire seasons have really proven that to us The drought that we've seen the insects related mortality Just kind of thing after thing is building up to show that our forests are at risk And they need they need some attention from us and you know what that means It can take a lot of different forms Then comes the mastication that chews up the non-merchable or submersionable trees choose them up like we saw earlier Blodgett forest it was it was set up to really be this living laboratory to bring researchers so that they could look at the Differences between certain management styles on different aspects of the forest ecosystem. We have areas where we've done nothing We've let it go. We have other areas where we've taken a much more active approach done commercial harvests Non-commercial treatments prescribed fire and we're able to really look at the trade-offs between those different types of treatments that we have here The basic tools that we have for knowing if the conditions are going to be good enough for us to burn a weather meter like this This can measure wind speed it can measure air temperature and it can measure relative humidity It is really logistically difficult to burn. It's hard to get permit windows weather windows The problem is so so vast that if we aren't able to take advantage of every possible window that we have regardless of the season You know, we're not gonna get closer to our goals In terms of land management in California, so that's why we're really trying to take advantage of any window We have we will be out there trying to put fire on the ground As we think about managing our forests We need to figure out how to deal with all of the down and dead material It's on the ground, you know the large limbs and sticks and also the brush and the small trees that are growing I'm just out there as fuel waiting for a wildfire It's a resource it's carbon is stuff, you know stuff that animals eat It's stuff that pest wants that pet pathogens wants and it also provides fuel to fire We're hopeful that maybe one day we can get to the point where there's actually a commercial market for that type of material We can take it off chip it send it to a biomass facility where it can be turned into energy for example So I think figuring out a place for all of the material that is readily available in the woods would really be kind of a Holy Grail for some of us. Yeah, I think you got to take the whole toolbox and the toolbox is mechanical treatments alone With no burning some prescribed fire treatments some combos, maybe livestock grazing I mean you got to put everything you got on the table, you know, they're everyone's forest We have small landowners. We have private landowners We have the Forest Service and the ability to manage across those different ownerships is going to be One key to the puzzle, but we need to be actively managing our forests and Investing the resources in them that they deserve