There’s a fire that reoccurs in downtown Rapid City about every two years.
But, Monday’s fire is a part of efforts at maintaining native foliage in a half-acre park.
Wilbur Holz is pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church. He stands under the bandshell at Trinity Eco Park watching a grassfire roil near downtown.
As smoke billows against the brick façade, Holz contemplates the role of fire in renewal, and regeneration at the park.
“It’s a place to demonstrate what natural can be and look like. How one can plan things in conjunction with nature, rather than trying to subdue and control nature," Holz said.
Holz said the park transforms every two to three days for a few weeks as it regrows.
Trinity Eco Park is about a half-acre in size and reflects four separate biomes found in western South Dakota. The greenspace and bandshell are a respite from the downtown concrete infrastructure. The park’s riparian zone also servs as a natural water filtration system with native aquatic plants like sedges and rushes accumulating toxic elements from nearby parking lots.
Anthony Checci is a steward of the park and said fire combats nonnative grasses that compete with native foliage.
“And allow for the native grasses to come back up in the place and thrive," Checci said. "So, that’s one reason to do the fire. Two, there’s a lot of litter here and it would take a long time to pull all of this out of here by hand. Fire makes quick work of that—puts a lot of the nutrients back into the ground so it can be pulled up by the plants again.”
Crews recently burned off grasses at the off-leash dog park in the Robbinsdale neighborhood too.
Eric O’Connor is wildfire mitigation lieutenant with the Rapid City Fire Department. He said the goal is to burn small and burn often.
“We almost want to get to the point where use fire effects in the city isn’t too much different than a person on a mower, you know?”
O’Connor said that’s community adaption to a fire adapted ecosystem.
