Meet KaliRose Witte

By Sue McMurray

Year: Junior
Program: Fire Ecology and Management
Hometown: Helena, Montana

Fire ecology and management students don’t have to go far to gain real-world experience. Less than 10 miles away from campus lies a wildland urban intermix that’s a perfect training ground for budding fire managers.

KaliRose Witte is one of nine women students in the CNR Wildland Fire Program. A junior from Helena, Mont., Witte and other students in Professor Penny Morgan’s prescribed burning lab were given opportunity to experience the process of putting fire back into an ecosystem to benefit privately-owned lands.

The class conducted several prescribed burns in the Viola area, working with local land owners including Dana and Kathy Dawes, who have worked with the University of Idaho over many years to provide site for research and other learning.

“We looked at the whole processes of looking at the plot before it was burned,” said Witte. “This included gathering data, writing the burn plan, burning the unit and then monitoring the plots again after the burn was completed to see if we met our objectives.”

The Dawes participated by giving the class the history of their property and expressed their desired outcomes after the burn. They also helped with building control lines and were present the day of the burn.

“Landowners can tell you very valuable information of the property which the science and monitoring alone cannot give you by gathering data at plots across a site,” said Witte. “The most valuable experience was writing the burn plans, which helped us understand prescription parameters required for actual ignition and sustained combustion. It was a good taste of what will be required of many of us in our future careers as we use fire to meet land management objectives.”