While feed is the initial reason animals travel to a burn after a few years, the new growth will also provide good bedding and cover. He also advises that you pick your burns carefully, because high mountain fires tend to have rocky soils which won’t grow new feed as well. Ballard said you may occasionally find same-year burns that provide good hunting, but the burn has to happen mid-summer with plenty of early season moisture to jump-start the regrowth. Jack Ballard, author of Elk Hunting Montana and other books, likes to target burns between two and ten years old because it gives the area plenty of time to grow the new forage to which elk and deer gravitate. Prairie wildfires, for example, can lead to an explosion of invasive, non-native grasses in the aftermath of the fire, choking out native plants and impacting local wildlife. Bishop warns that not all burns make for good hunting opportunities.
It’s not as easy as finding a recent fire on your maps and hunting there, though.
When fires do occur, ungulates take advantage of the high quality forage, which isn’t always readily available. This layer helps you target old burns by illustrating the extent of the burn, the year the fire took place and the name of the complex.Ĭhad Bishop, director of Wildlife Biology at the University of Montana, says feed is the primary reason deer and elk seek out burned areas. It was in this constant tension that we found the inspiration for our Historic Fire Layer. Here at onX, located in the Northern Rockies, we curse wildfires during the summer and sing their praises during the fall. The young generation of plants growing in burned areas provides high quality food sources and attracts big game animals like deer and elk.
Forest health is dependent on regular fires as the flames and ash release nutrients into the soil allowing new growth to form. The chaos and damage of wildfires may make a forest look like a moonscape, but with that devastation also comes opportunity for great hunting. With the up-to-date Active Wildfires Layer, you can save yourself a lot of time and miles if your second or third spot is right by a fire or-even worse-on fire.” Trent from Born and Raised Outdoors notes, “We’re always telling people that want to hunt elk out of state to have at least three different spots picked out, just in case you can’t find elk in your primary spot. Tap inside the fire’s boundary to view more information, including fire name, current size, and the date the information was pulled into the app. When you zoom in, you’re able to view the current borders and name of the fire. When you have the Active Wildfires Layer turned on, red flame icons mark the locations of active wildfires when you’re at a higher zoom level. This nationwide layer displays the National Interagency Fire Center data, is updated daily, and is based on NIFC’s definition of active fires. We have an Active Wildfires Layer in the onX Hunt App for that very reason: to help you stay abreast of ongoing wildfires throughout the season. When we’re in the hills scouting with summer hunts in mind, it’s imperative to know what the current fire situation is, so we can stay out of the way of working interagency fire crews. Western hunters inevitably turn an eye to the hills, watching for puffs of smoke.
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