The hot weather, crazy winds and forest fires of last week are a memory now. A cabin on Spoonbill Lake burned to the ground while the owners watched from their boat. Some northerners are returning home after being evacuated for a week.
Our boreal forest is meant to burn to renew itself. The jack pine cones don't even open without the extreme heat of a forest fire. Blueberries, fire weed and other plants are waiting in the wings for acidic soil of a fire. For us humans, though, a forest fire can be viewed as a disaster. We must try to take these natural events in stride. Some days we can't fly because of smoke that can cover 1000s of square miles. Some times we need to stay off the portages after lightning strikes. In very rare situations we need to evacuate people out of the path of the fire, but in this country there is always a boat and lots of water to escape to.For the next month and a half, forest fire fighters will be working the recent fires, putting out hot spots and checking things out and finally declaring each fire out one by one.
Here are some pictures taken by our friend Chris Sherwin who fights these fires for a living.
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