Crews used a “light hand on the land,” clearing and carving fire lines without the use of bulldozers in order to reduce the impact in the ecologically-sensitive region, which is home to some 200 rare plants.
MOJAVE NATIONAL PRESERVE, Calif. — Firefighters aided by rain fought to contain a massive blaze that swept through the California desert into Nevada and was California’s largest wildfire this year. As of Tuesday night it had burned through more than 125 square miles of land but showed little growth during the day and was 23% contained, fire officials said.
“You bring a bunch of bulldozers in there, you may or may not stop the fire, but you’ll put a scar on the landscape that’ll last generations,” said Tim Chavez, an assistant chief for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. of the vast wildland preserve, crossed the state line into Nevada on Sunday and sent smoke further east into the Las Vegas Valley.
The territory is a varied desert landscape — mountains and canyons, sand dunes and mesas, Joshua tree forests and volcanic cinder cones — and features about 10,000 threatened desert tortoise within its boundaries.
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