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My question? What is the effect of forest fires, on animals? The answer? The effect is great, and not only on animals, but on all wild life. Animals living in the environment are greatly affected by fires set in the forest. Honestly, you don’t hear a lot about the effect, of the fire, on the animals, but it is there. I found it rather difficult to find information on this topic, but it, to, is there. Fires obviously destroy things, objects, plants, and even homes. Lately, there have been a lot of reports, on the news, about homes, shops, and even a church, burning down. Almost all threats against wild life fires are over-looked. During droughts extra caution should be taken. A single cigarette butt could burn down an entire forest, a leaf catching on fire could catch 100 more leaves on fire, possibly lighting the leaves, on a tree, on fire, thus leading to the entire tree burning down, then the whole forest. And if the forest is gone, so are the habitats the animals were living in. With every fire started, an animal loses its home. Species are dying out, some even going extinct, and we can’t even ATTEMPT to save them? The precautions, needed to be taken, aren’t that difficult. IF you are going to start a fire, have a water source near by, just incase the fire gets out of hand. Don’t start fires in an incredibly dry area. If you accidentally start a fire, pour liquid on it, and if no type of liquid is near, stomp it out, don’t just let it spread.

                                     From the beginning of the year, right up to 12/9/06, 1,233 fires have been reported and contained. As of 12/1/06 there have been 7 new, large, fires. Only four have been contained. From those 7 fires, 848 acres of land were burnt down. You might be able to count the number of animals on one acre, but imagine that times 848. Animals dying and their homes being destroyed. The average acres burned between 2000 and 2006, has drastically increased. In 2000 7,319,273 acres of land were burned. Between 1/1/06 and 12/9/06 9,589,836 fire were reported. As I said earlier, only 1,233 of those fires were contained. Think of how many animals died, and how many homes were destroyed. Yes I admit, “Think of the people” a lot of human homes have also burnt down. At the rate of fires per year, in a few years, many species could be extinct. If our animals die, then what are we going to eat?