Firefighters aided by rain fought to contain a massive blaze that swept through the California desert into Nevada and could threaten the region's famous spiky Joshua trees.
Fire that erupted last Friday 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.
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. The fire started on private lands within the preserve, but the cause remains under investigation. Less than 3% of the land in the 2,500-square mile preserve is privately owned.
Some of the preserve’s plants can take centuries to recover from destruction. It could take the pinyon-juniper woodlands alone roughly 200 to 300 years to return, while the blackbrush scrub and Joshua trees — which grow only in the Mojave Desert — are unlikely to regrow after this catastrophic blaze, said Ileene Anderson, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity.
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