The Rx Fire Field Guide created by the Placer County Resource Conservation District serves as a landowner education tool and provides a framework to guide discussions on prescribed burning between natural resource management agencies and private landowners. In addition to addressing common questions related to prescribed fire (such as permitting, liability, and preparatory work), it also assists landowners and agency representatives to classify prescribed burn units as Low, Moderate, or High Complexity and offers methods for minimizing risks and hazard abatement.
Many landowners cite lacking the appropriate knowledge or resources to include prescribed fire in their management toolbox. The Rx Fire Field Guide strives to fill knowledge gaps, equipping landowners with the facts on how to use prescribed fire in a safe, legal, and ecologically beneficial manner.
Why Prescribed Fire?
Prescribed burning is a critical tool for land stewardship in California’s fire-dependent ecosystems. More than a century of fire suppression policies and the forced removal of indigenous people who actively managed the land have significantly increased fuel loading. As a result, many landowners are pursuing wildfire protection through defensible space, home gardening, and fuels reduction, with growing interest in the financial and ecological benefits of prescribed burning.