Fire danger in Bark Beetle land

The wildfire in Boulder County this weekend is a terrible thing, many people have lost their homes, and others are in limbo while firefighters work hard to save their homes. This terrible event got me thinking about how lucky I am to live in Crested Butte. Sure, our weather and altitude necessitates us to be hardy and unduly optimistic, i.e. looking forward to shovelling snow in big snow years as it's a great upper body workout! But the benefits of living in a harsher clime are being spared the pine beetle devestation that has claimed millions of trees to our north, and having more moisture year round than many other places in Colorado.

We rarely have drought situations here - in fact we have had so much rain this summer, I haven't watered my lawn since the end of July. In contrast, Boulder had a month of no rain which added to the dry conditions that fueled the wildfire.

The bark beetle situation is the one that scares me the most. Anyone who has driven I-70 near Dillon has seen the endless acres of copper colored trees killed by bark beetles. The US Forest Service just announced plans to cut down 14,000 acres of dead trees caused by the bark beetles at a cost of $30 million. Unfortunately, the beetles are estimated to have killed trees in about 3000 square miles of Colorado lands, which is the equivalent of 1,920,000 acres - which would cost $4.1 billion to cut down! I doubt we will get those resources, and clearly to burn down the trees would take a considerable amount of manpower, timing and luck - not to mention the air pollution that it would cause.

I don't think there is any great solution to this devestating problem. So, instead I keep an eye on the pine trees and keep hoping they remain alive and green here. I try not to drive on I-70 near Dillon and Silverthorne (unlike many that drive from Denver to Vail) because I can only imagine how devestating it would be to be stuck on that slow moving highway during a wildfire. And I feel very fortunate to live in the amazing place in which I live.

(Diane Aronovic is a former Managing Director at Bank of America Securities, and a real estate agent at Red Lady Realty in Crested Butte, CO)