Forestry mascot Spruce Moose throws out first pitch

PALMER — The Alaska Division of Forestry mascot the ‘Spruce Moose’ threw out the first pitch at the Tuesday matchup between the Mat-Su Miners and the Anchorage Glacier Pilots at Hermon Brothers Field. The new mascot made just his second appearance ever, imploring Alaskans to “take time to learn before you burn.” The only previous appearance of the moose before Tuesday night was at a Peninsula Oilers game.

“We are delivering the message of safe burning practices, so the take time to learn before you burn campaign and it’s all about being safe with your burn barrels and being safe with your campfires. We’re just talking about safe burning and what the wildland firefighters are doing and what the DOF does for the state of Alaska,” said project assistant Lyssa Banbury. “A significant amount of forest fires and wildland fires are caused by human caused factors so a lot of what we do is just trying to get out into different public organizations and different groups and reach different demographics.”

The Alaska Division of Forestry responded to 135,926.6 acres of wildfire in 2020 out of 181,253.3 total across the state, according to the DOF 2020 annual report. Forestry employees drove a bright yellow truck behind the merchandise shack and gave away bags, baseballs and stickers to kids. The forestry employees also distributed literature on being firewise, how homeowners can protect their homes with defensible spaces and the “ready, set, go” campaign.

“Firewise is a program or information that we give out to homeowners to help us help them in the event of a wildland fire, because that’s really a significant part of how we do our job, how we’re able to save structures is if you can do the little bit of work ahead of time throughout the year clearing brush, making sure that you have a defensible space around your property then we come in and we can save your property and it makes our job a lot easier and it makes us a lot safer while we’re trying to do our job as well,” said Banbury.

The ‘Spruce Moose’ was a hit with kids at the ballpark, and will begin making appearances at schools as the semester begins next month.

“Smokey Bear is his mentor,” said Banbury.

More information on wildland fires can be found at http://forestry.alaska.gov/fire/current.htm