Benefits of Prescribed Burning

• Many of North Carolina's natural ecosystems require periodic fire for their survival. Prescribed burning is essential to the perpetuation, restoration, and management of many plant and animal communities. Fire consumes plant matter which releases nutrients. The nutrients increase the growth and yield of plants that provide forage and an area for escape and brooding and that satisfy other habitat needs. Prescribed burning benefits game, nongame, and endangered wildlife species by enhancing wildlife habitat.
• Forestlands are economic, biological, and aesthetic resources of statewide significance. In addition to reducing the frequency and severity of wildfires, prescribed burning of forestlands helps to prepare sites for replanting and natural seeding, to control insects and diseases, and to increase productivity.
• Prescribed burning enhances the resources on public use lands, such as State and national forests, wildlife refuges, nature preserves, and game lands as well as private lands managed for similar purposes.
• Prescribed fire reduces the naturally occurring buildup of vegetative fuels on forestlands, thereby reducing the risk and severity of wildfires and lessening the loss of life and property.
• The State's ever-increasing population is resulting in urban development directly adjacent to fire-prone forestlands, referred to as a wildland-urban interface area. The use of prescribed burning in these wildland-urban interface areas substantially reduces the risk of wildfires that cause damage.