The Fire That Cleaned the Forest

In August 2020, firefighters in Northern California watched the SCU Lightning Complex burn across 400,000 acres of drought-parched land. Ranchers wept as flames consumed what generations had built. Yet within eighteen months, botanists documented something remarkable near Livermore — native lupine and poppies were blooming in meadows that hadn't seen wildflowers in decades. Invasive grasses that had choked the soil for years were gone.…