Defensible space and fire mitigation in Crystal Bay, NV

Crystal Bay is tiny: the Census counts about 215 housing units on less than half a square mile at the state line. In a place that compact, your neighbor's house and trees sit inside your 100-foot zone, and yours sit inside theirs.

At a glance

• About 71% of buildings in the indirect exposure zone: embers and house-to-house fire
• Lakeshore lots: TRPA permit over 6 inches between house and lake
• Nearly half of the homes were built before 1960
• About 53 minutes from Carson City without traffic

What does indirect exposure mean on a small lot?

The USDA Forest Service sorts buildings by how wildfire would reach them. In Crystal Bay about 27% are in the direct zone, next to wildland vegetation. About 71% are in the indirect zone, where ignition comes from embers or from a burning building nearby. Risk to homes overall ranks higher than 92.9% of US communities.

For most Crystal Bay homes, then, the first threat is an ember landing on something that will burn within a few feet of the wall. That puts Zone 0 at the top of the list.

The first five feet

The Living With Fire guide calls the strip from the wall to 5 feet the ember-resistant zone. It asks for no junipers, no dead leaves or pine needles, no wood mulch, no woodpiles and no weeds there. On an older lakeside home that often means taking out foundation shrubs planted decades ago, pruning back the limbs that hang over the roof and deck, and clearing needles out of every corner.

Our part is the vegetation and the debris. The deck boards, vents, gutters and roof are yours or your builder's. Why junipers go first is explained in junipers and other high-hazard plants next to the house.

Old cabins, big trees

About 59% of Crystal Bay's homes were built before 1980 and nearly half before 1960 (American Community Survey; a very small community, so treat these as rough). Trees that were saplings when those houses went up now stand over them.

Where a large tree has died or been approved for removal and there is no room to lower it past the house, a crane can lift it out in sections. That is on the Crystal Bay crane tree removal page.

Lakeshore lots have a tighter limit

Across the Tahoe Basin a permit is needed to remove a live tree over 14 inches in diameter at breast height. On a lakeshore lot the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency drops that to 6 inches for trees between the house and the lake. Crystal Bay has lots that run down to the water, so measure before you plan.

TRPA says removal for defensible space can be permitted by the local fire agency. For Crystal Bay that is the North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District, which evaluates the property. The agency decides. We work from what it approves.

Getting there and getting in

Crystal Bay is about 33 miles from our yard, about 53 minutes without traffic by way of Incline Village. Lots are small and many are steep, so the arborist checks where a chip truck can stand during the free estimate. Where it cannot get close, brush and limbs are carried out by hand.

Five perimeter records of 300 acres or more since 1980 have centers within about 10 miles, among them the Royal Fire of 2003 (339 acres, centered about 3 miles away) and the Martis Fire of 2001 (14,429 acres).