Connection to my Master Plan

For this course, I wanted to think about an issue in evolution that was connected to California. I decided to look at fire adaptations in chaparral ecosystems. The native people of California used fire as a management technique for thousands of years, previous to that, fires were common in dry climates and could be caused by lightning. Managing with fire allowed for the maintenance of meadows and to support new growth and built on the adaptations plants in this area already had. In California, it is becoming increasingly clear that small prescribed burns might be beneficial in preventing some of the large fires growing even more dangerous because of the continuous growth of the Wildland Urban Interface. Learning about place and connection to place is important to me and part of my master plan and this project increased my knowledge and understanding of how plants have evolved with fire and how traditional ecological knowledge might inform current day management techniques.