The tree population in California is dense, and it’s hurting forests, according to The Economist.
The average forested acre in the Golden State today contains more than 300 trees, six times the amount recorded in the early 1900s. Although it appears to be a victory for conservation, the increased tree load provides more fuel to create hotter fires and sucks up more water from the state’s depleted water table, the report said.
The problems have led California Forest Service to begin thinning the forest. About 600 square miles of forest were thinned in 2016 before October, an increase from 367 square miles in all of 2015. The thinning rate should be five times that, Roger Bales, a hydrologist at the University of California—Merced, told The Economist.
Read the full story at The Economist.
