This past Earth Day (April 22) I visited Esalen Institute in Big Sur and spoke on results of forest restoration using fire mimicry in California to the farm and garden staff. I also had the occasion to inspect and photograph several oaks that were treated with fire mimicry at an Earth Day event in 2012. These photos show pretty remarkable improvement in the canopy size and density of the oaks over the past four years, with one exception. The last oak in the photo sets below is in a very windy location. It has shown slight improvement over the years, but this year is exhibiting some browning of the leaves. I suspect this browning is a result of the very dry conditions in 2015. All of these oaks will receive another round of care this spring. Many thanks to the Esalen community for their support of this oak restoration effort!
Sudden Oak Life 
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