Montgomery Parks is planning prescribed fires for two county parks in the coming weeks in hopes of boosting conservation of rare and native habitats, according to Ryan Colliton, a vegetation ecologist for terrestrial management for the department.
“If we don’t maintain the processes that maintain these habitats, we will lose them and their uniqueness will go away over time,” Colliton told Bethesda Today earlier this month.
The prescribed fires, which are also called “controlled burns” or “prescribed burns,” are planned for the River Road Shale Barrens and the Serpentine Barren conservation parks.
Prescribed fires are a vegetation management technique that mimics “historic ecosystem disturbances that maintain and enhance native biological diversity and in turn make it more resilient,” according to the Montgomery Parks website. The fires help remove unwanted vegetation and a layer of dead plant material to allow sunlight and rain to reach the soil surface and promote the regeneration of native plant species.
“Historically, the state of Maryland, our habitats, our natural communities, evolved with fire. Whether that was a lightning strike, wildfires or intentionally set fires by indigenous people, they’ve been going on for tens of thousands of years and our [ecosystem] adapted to that and the [plant] species that grow here are adapted to that,” Colliton said. “If we don’t maintain the natural processes of these habitats, we can’t maintain the habitat.”
One of the most unique and rare habitats in the county is its serpentine barrens that give the conservation park its name, Colliton said. The park consists of three areas totaling more than 350 acres that are south of Travilah Road, west from Piney Meetinghouse Road and directly south of the Rockville Crushed Stoned Quarry in Rockville, according to Montgomery Parks.
“Serpentine ecosystems are globally rare and occur intermittently in an arc east of the Appalachian Mountains from Alabama to Maine. The largest serpentine ecosystems on the East Coast are found in Maryland and Pennsylvania,” the Montgomery Parks website states.
The types of plant communities that thrive at the serpentine barrens are Western, prairie-type species, such as prairie dropseed and skullcaps, Colliton said.
While the shale barrens in the River Road Shale Barrens Conservation Park are not as globally rare as the serpentine barrens, they are unique for the county, according to Colliton. He noted that a native prickly-pear cactus grows in the county’s shale barrens located in the conservation park off River Road in Poolesville.
With the prescribed fires in the parks, Colliton says Montgomery Parks is looking to “reestablish the plant communities that have disappeared over time due to build up” of fallen leaves and plant materials.
“Our goal here is to promote the whole community and all the species that are representative of that community,” Colliton said. “So, the idea is that fire will benefit and bring back more native diversity, and in doing so, support other diversity, such as insects or birds and other wildlife.”
When will the prescribed fires occur?
It is not easy to schedule a date for the prescribed fires, Colliton said, because conditions for setting the fires are weather dependent.
“If the weather forecast changes overnight and we wake up and it doesn’t meet our parameters, then we’re not going to do it,” Colliton said. “And so, from a weather standpoint, what we’re trying to do is avoid really high winds, really dry weather and really dry fuel. We will not burn in those conditions.”
In addition, the parks department has a “self-imposed deadline” of April 15 to conduct the burns. If the prescribed fire is not completed by that date, then the parks department will have to wait until next year, according to Colliton.
So far this year the parks department has not conducted any prescribed fires. Colliton said two days were planned, but the weather forecast changed overnight, and the fires had to be canceled.
“Weather controls everything,” Colliton said.
He noted it was important for community members to be aware that they will likely see smoke but no actual flames when the prescribed fires do occur. He also said communities near the location of prescribed fires will be notified and the department will have communicated with county emergency services as well.
“I know people want hard, concrete dates, but that’s just not something we’re able to do,” Colliton said.
Montgomery Parks will notify the public about the prescribed fires on social media, Colliton said, and post the dates on its website.
