Hey Ron, scorched landscapes wouldn't be so bad if there were more regular burns. The problem is that since fire are suppressed so regularly, so much fuel gets built up that when a fire hits, it's devastating. Evidence shows that historically every square foot of California was burned at least once every 20 years, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was more often than that. The whole state would have been like a beautiful park. You can still see pictures from the mid-1800s that show the large trees and clear underbrush. It was beautiful and well-managed. Yosemite Valley didn't even have any pine trees. It just had huge oaks in beautiful grasslands. It must have been something to behold.
