On October 17, 2020, the pine forest north of the Cal-Wood Education Center burst into flames. The blaze burned over half of the 1200-acre mountaintop before jumping over Lefthand Canyon drive into Heil Valley Ranch and eventually travelling up US Highway 36, destroying twenty homes and damaging two more along the west side of the highway before fire teams were able to bring it to a standstill. The fire consumed over 10,106 acres and is the largest recorded fire in Boulder County history.

On the one-year anniversary of the fire, Cal-Wood executive director Rafael Salgado opened the facility to regional media representatives to give private tours of the burn scar, and to speak about the recovery that has taken place so far. He also gave a glimpse into the future of Cal-Wood and the direction that the center will be going.

Standing on the porch overlooking the northern section of the facility, Salgado described the development of the fire and the path that it travelled. It had initially started on the hillside west of the main lodge, and a portion had travelled east, while another section split and moved west past the lodge and cabins. Salgado explained that while this fire was destructive, the vegetation around the lodge had recovered, because the fire had not yet matured.

The camp had been evacuated, except for Salgado, who had insisted on staying. “I convinced the fire commander to let me stay, because I wanted to help out,” he said. “I told the fire commander, let me feed your firefighters. We have beds, I can get the generators going, we can power, internet, and all that.”

This became especially relevant when fire teams responded from outside of the state. “There were some guys from Pennsylvania, and Montana, at one point we had like seventy fire fighters here,” explained Salgado. With the food that was already available and the ability to provide housing, it negated any logistical issues that may have affected the ability to address the fire effectively.

Examining the burn scars Above, left; A stand of trees at the Cal-Wood Outdoor Education Center outside of Jamestown. October 17, 2021, marked the one-year anniversary of the fire that became the largest in Boulder County’s history. Above, right; A closeup of an etching made by students from CU. Bottom, right; Rafael Salgado, the Executive Director of Cal-Wood, explains fire and forest management at a recent tour of the facilities on October 17, 2021. This was a year to the day after a fire swept through Cal-Wood scorching over 600 acres on the property and eventually burning 10,106 total acres making it the largest in Boulder County history.[/caption]

Salgado’s refusal to abandon the facility comes from a long commitment to Cal-Wood. “I wanted to be here. It was really heartbreaking to see the whole property burn up, obviously.” he said, “This is a personal thing. I’ve been up here for twenty-three years.”

Cal-Wood is a non-profit organization that works to connect children and their families to the outdoors using a variety of programs. These include school programs which are science based, and allows students to stay at the facility for three days and two nights.

Also offered are summer youth camps and camps that specifically target Latino families, “because that population needs that connection to the mountains, and we have the expertise here,” said Salgado. Salgado acknowledged almost every Front Range school district had been to Cal-Wood, and approximately 40% of the kids that attend the camp are either low-income, or minority students, which falls into the original mission of the original donor of the land.

Salgado is contemplating the future of the facility, and the fire experience has been a reminder of the power of the natural cycles of the forest and our interactions and influences on its overall health.

One potential benefit from the fire is the educational opportunities presented by this natural event. Now, the students have the chance to learn about fire ecology. The possibility for research projects in the burn area is one that can be accessed, and the information gained could help fire responders more effectively combat fire events in the future.

“There’s a lot of conversation about fire mitigation, how important it is to do thinning… for forest health, just to minimize another fire like this,” he said. “For years, CalWood has been doing a lot of fire mitigation. We do between twenty to fifty acres a year of just thinning, but it just wasn’t enough. We just need to be more aggressive.” He explained that the fire had burned uncontrollably, with 100% mortality to the trees in areas that had not been mitigated, while the areas which had been mitigated showed signs of surviving the fire.

“The Ponderosas are made for fire, the big ones, so they’ll continue growing. But the little guys are not,” he explained. The smaller trees in between feed the fires. He acknowledged that the mitigation effort is difficult because of both cost and access, with much of the work being done by Cal-Wood staff.

Of the six hundred acres that were burnt in the fire, approximately two hundred are recoverable. They have conducted a mulching recovery with Boulder County to drop wood chips on the burn areas project to prevent soil erosion caused by storms and runoff. When the mulch is spread over the affected area it prevents large raindrops from spreading bare dirt. He explained that if the plants are given a chance to recover a root foundation it will aid in preventing soil loss.

Over the last year, and the recent spring growth season, plants and flowers appeared which gave Salgado hope, and caused him to think. “We saw flowers that we had never seen before. This was so full of green, and flowers. There was one flower that we had not seen for years.” They had a wet spring, and Salgado acknowledged that the land needs fires to be healthy. Even in the aftermath of the fire he recalls seeing green grasses growing in the period before the first snowfall.

Salgado has started to work with the University of Colorado (CU) to create art projects on the property. In the burn scar, using the burnt stumps of about ten trees the students made metallic tree ring etchings. He plans on making them permanent additions to the landscape, reminders of the destruction caused by the fire, but also realizing the scientific opportunities created in the recovery. Cal-Wood is also in the beginning stages of creating a wildfire research lab and forest management training center. It will allow researchers to study the effects of the fire and the recovery process at the burn area at Cal- Wood.

You can donate to Cal-Wood’s recovery fund at their Coloradogives.org site. https://www.coloradogives.org/CalWoodEducationCenter/ overview?step=step1

For more information about Cal-Wood’s education programs, visit their website at: https://www.calwood.org or call 303-449-0603.

Cal-Wood Education Center is located at 2282 County Road 87, Jamestown, Colorado, 80455.