Recently, much of the debate about forest health and forest restoration has focused on the “urban-wildland interface,” or those forest areas immediately surrounding towns, cities, and other human settlements. This makes sense, since it is in areas where human lives could be lost, and where houses and other structures can burn down, that the effects of severe wildfire are most immediately felt.

But areas surrounding settlements are not the only places in need of restoration treatments. Just consider the effects large, severe wildfires can have across the landscape:

• Old-growth trees may be destroyed
• Severe soil erosion may occur
• Lakes and drainages may fill with eroded sediment
• Noxious, invasive plant species may invade
• Wildlife habitat may be degraded
• Recreational and aesthetics values may be lost
• Archaeological or cultural resources may be damaged or destroyed.

Furthermore, unnatural fire severity is only one symptom of an unhealthy forest. Wildland areas are subject to the same sorts of symptoms of ecological distress as urban-wildland interface areas, such as bark beetle epidemics, decline in the health of older trees, loss of nutrient cycling, and alteration of wildlife habitat. These problems need to be addressed. If we focus all our management attention on the urban-wildland interface, we will in effect ignore the effects of more than a century of forest mismanagement on wildland forest areas that have the greatest potential for ecological integrity.

Restoration treatments need to be implemented across the landscape. This does not mean they need to be placed on the entire landscape, but it does mean that they need to be intelligently planned to maximize protection from high-intensity fires.