Truckee Community Recreation Center will be hosting a free, two-part speaker series in conjunction with the FOREST⇌FIRE Exhibition currently on display at the Center. Local citizens, land and business owners, residents, and community leaders are invited to learn why the forest is so vulnerable to catastrophic fire and what we can all do about it.

On April 29, “Visioning our Future Forest: Restoration Processes” addressed the ways we can restore our forests to be resilient to catastrophic fire and a warming atmosphere. Speakers included local scientists Eric Vane, MS, Silviculturist; and Rachel Hutchinson, MS, District Ranger (Acting), both working on the US Forest Service, Tahoe National Forest.

On May 13, “Visioning our Future Forest: Prescribed Fire and Smoke” will address the differences between wildfire, prescribed fire, controlled burning and cultural burning; and the role of fire and the challenges of smoke in forest restoration. Speakers include local scientists Linda Ferguson, Fuels Specialist, and Leland Tarney, PhD, Physical Ecologist, both working on the US Forest Service, Tahoe National Forest.

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Each presentation will be followed by an audience Q & A. The series will be hosted by Michael Llewellyn, the co-creator of the FOREST⇌FIRE Exhibition. “We hope participants will come to understand the benefits of forest restoration and prescribed burning on public lands, so they can begin to apply these processes to help our forest and themselves on private lands as well,” said Llewellyn.

Visioning Our Future Forest is part of the FOREST⇌FIRE Project, presented by Nevada County Arts Council, Truckee Donner Recreation and Parks District, and UC Berkeley–Sagehen Creek Field Station, in partnership with the project creators, Michael and Heather Llewellyn of Llewellyn Studio.

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Visioning Our Future Forest was made possible with support from California Humanities, a nonprofit partner of the National Endowment for the Humanities (calhum.org), and by the generosity of California Arts Council’s Creative California Communities grant program, Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation and their Nature Fund and Queen of Hearts Fund, Tahoe Truckee Excellence in Education Foundation, University of Nevada – Reno, Cal Fire, Tahoe Truckee Airport District, and many others.

Source: Nevada County Arts Council