At the wheel of his Land Rover, Dominique Sauboua, 76, seems dumbfounded when he travels the roads of the charred forest of La Teste-de-Buch (Gironde). On both sides of runway 214, the air is still thick, the smell pungent, Thursday July 21. Hearths remain active. In twelve days, 7,000 hectares have burned in this town, estimates the prefect of Gironde, Fabienne Buccio, during what the firefighters call “the fire of the century”. In the same department, 13,800 other hectares of pine forest went up in smoke, in another fire, near Landiras, a town located 60 km to the east. The two lights are now “fixed”but “are not, however, extinct”warned the prefect on Monday.
After several days spent helping firefighters from Vendée, Dominique, himself the owner of 50 hectares in the forest of La Teste-de-Buch, goes around looking for recalcitrant smokers. To distinguish himself from the inhabitants, banned from the disaster area, he wears a fluorescent yellow jersey from the Defense of Forests against Fires (DFCI), of which he is a volunteer.
After the disaster, the question of the reconstruction of the forest is already at the center of concerns. Emmanuel Macron approached it on Wednesday, during his visit to the scene. A major national project was promised to replant the local pine forests. And from this week, all the professionals in the sector will be brought together to establish a roadmap, confirms the Ministry of Agriculture to franceinfo. Development and maintenance of these artificial forests, planted species, cultivation models… There are many topics for discussion.
Behind his tinted glasses, Dominique wonders: “So far, it’s been a mess in the forest. Maybe we’ll take advantage of it to evolve?” For now, he squints and scans the area. The pensioner scrutinizes the base of the incandescent trunks. Small flames sometimes arise from the hollow of a gutted pine. At their sight, he starts in a hurry. “We will accelerate, he can fall on us.”
These trees that burn from the inside have long been exploited by man. “My grandfather was a gemmer in Landiras”, confides the septuagenarian. He cut the maritime pines to collect the precious resin. Since then, trees planted more than a century ago have dried up the marshy soils and produced this resin, which was necessary for the manufacture of solvents until the end of the 1970s.
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Today, 90% of trees of the Landes forest are pines, a highly flammable species. Since he acquired his plot, Dominique has therefore forbidden his family to go to the field in times of heat wave. “I also rebuke campers who light up a barbecue between the pines.” Knowing that nine out of 10 fires are of human origin, according to the Ministry of Ecological Transition.
At this stage, the investigation has not determined the origin of the various claims. But this month of July showed it: the main risk is that a fire reaches the tops of the trees. “Most of the biomass is concentrated there, so the fire increases in power”, describes Anne Ganteaume, research director at INRAe Aix-en-Provence. “If there is wind, and if the massifs are continuous [comme c’est le cas dans les forêts de Landiras et une partie de celle de La Teste], It’s finish”, completes the specialist.
With the pine, the situation accelerates quickly: when the pine cones burn, “they explode”. Their scales are “blown by the wind up to hundreds of meters, sometimes kilometers, and can cause fire swings that are difficult for firefighters to manage.” Added to this is the resin of conifers which contains “of the highly flammable chemical molecules”.
In the Landes, the pine was planted in monoculture, that is to say without it being associated with other varieties of trees. Would a fire have been less devastating if there had been other species more resistant to fire, such as oak? Anne Ganteaume disputes the idea of “miracles wrought by more diverse forests”.
“The monoculture of pines does not increase the risk of fire.”
Anne Ganteaume, research director at INRAe Aix-en-Provenceat franceinfo
“Maritime pines have been accustomed to fire for millennia. Their bark is resistant, there are no dead branches along the trunk. This self-pruning prevents the fire from passing from the ground to the crown”she assures.
The problem arises, however, according to Anne Ganteaume, “when the forest is not managed, not maintained”. In width, the fire progresses when not cut by “great firewalls” enough. In height, the fire passes from the ground to the summit when the undergrowth is not well maintained and “shrubs grow”. In the case of the user forest of La Teste, a natural forest made up of pines and other species, the two risks overlapped.
Who is responsible for this interview? In Gironde, the situation is complex. If, in Landiras, the area that went up in smoke was exploited for industry, the Teste-de-Buch forest is owned by a thousand-sheet owners. “In the part that burned, three statuses coexist: part of the forest is managed by the National Forestry Office (ONF). Another is a private forest. The last is the user forest”recounts Christine Bouisset, lecturer at the University of Pau and Pays de l’Adour.
Two millennia old, the user forest of La Teste-de-Buch, 3,900 hectares almost completely affected by the fire, is the only one in France still governed by so-called “bailettes and transactions” rules from the 15th century. Since then, the users, inhabitants of the municipalities in the south of the Arcachon basin, can freely harvest dead wood from this natural forest for heating. Some can also recover green wood to build their house or a boat.
In this user forest, a hundred owners own the land and must maintain their plot. But, like Dominique, they are not full owners of the trees. They cannot therefore freely cut and market the wood. Plots, fragmented by successive inheritances, are not maintained either, for lack of known owners.
For several years, disputes are accumulating between plot holders and users. Some owners do not understand that the Forest Code, in force in the rest of the territory, does not apply to them. It would allow them to cut and market their wood, without the agreement of the beneficiaries of the right of use. In 2020, an owner, Thibaud Lemaire, submitted a management plan that would allow him to exploit the wood independently. Addufu, the association for the defense of user rights and forest users (1,200 members), and two elected officials EELV and LREM opposed it, for fear of opening the way to massive cutting of trees.
In addition, work by the Defense of Forests against fires, planned for the start of 2021, could have made it possible to widen the lanes and facilitate the movement of firefighters. A “imperative of public order”, according to a rapOrt of the Ministry of Agriculture of January 2022. But Addufu opposed it, via an appeal to the administrative court of Bordeaux, before being dismissed in 2021. “Everyone wanted this work, but we feared the greed of some!” rectifies Jean-Claude Dupoy, 80, grandson of gemmer and member of Addufu. The association demanded a fair distribution of income from the felling of pines during development.
Work finally began in July 2022, the day before the fire, confirms Southwest (subscriber only). Pointed out for the delay in the arrangements, the Addufu denounces for its part another delay, attributable according to it to the Forest fire protection : “Why did she wait 14 months to start the road widening work on July 5, 2022 during very hot weather?” questions the association on Facebook on July 23. Contacted by franceinfo, the DFCI did not respond.
For his part, the mayor of La Teste-de-Buch, Patrick Davet (Union of the right and the center), evokes a radical solution to ensure the proper maintenance of the premises: “I asked the President of the Republic that the user forest be managed by the municipalityhe pleads. This will prevent people from wanting to make a lot of money by cutting down my forest… And we will impose cleaning to prevent the spread of fires.” In the future, when the smell of ashes will once again give way to the essences of the forest.