Active incidents in the Shasta-Trinity.

This morning, InciWeb — the fire-tracking website covering all federal land management agencies — lit up with reports from all over national forests in Northern California and Southern Oregon. Crews are working dozens and dozens of small lightning strike wildfires in the Six Rivers National Forest, the Shasta-Trinity National Forest, the Klamath National Forest and the Modoc National Forest. Extremely dry, drought-damaged lands do not mix well with lightning storms.

“This last storm brought a lot of lightning and not much moisture,” said Bridget Litten, a public information officers at Six Rivers National Forest HQ here in Eureka, in a telephone call with the Outpost this afternoon. The strikes sparked at least 20 small-scale blazes on SRNF lands — that they know of — and firefighters are quickly hustling all over that huge expanse of land, getting each fire under control as quickly as they can, lest they spread into something larger.

Litten said that almost all the fires that have been discovered so far in Six Rivers’ district have been less than two or three acres in size — many of them less than an acre — and firefighters have successfully contained many of them already. The largest of there fires, which the Outpost mentioned yesterday, is up in the Gasguet area — the so-called “Devil Fire, which new mapping has taken down to just 20 acres in size, and is now fully contained.

The forest service hopes to do additional aerial reconnaissance this afternoon, Litten said, hoping to make sure there aren’t any hot spots out there that they’re missing. One problem: Weather conditions are such that more lightning strikes in the hills might be possible this afternoon. And tomorrow looks to be a scorcher.

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UPDATE, 1:57 p.m.: True — we neglected to mention the Bald Fire, which is not on Forest Service land but which has grown up to 37 acres on Bald Hills Road between Orick and Weitchpec. Calfire is in fighting that one.

CHP is providing traffic control on Bald Hills Road.

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Press release from Six Rivers National Forest:

Lightning across the Six Rivers National Forest over the two days has started at least 20 wildfires. At this time, there are 8 fires on the Gasquet Ranger District, the forest’s northernmost district; 1 fire on the Orleans District; 7 fires on the Lower Trinity District; and 4 fires on the Mad River District, on the southern end of the forest.

The largest of these fires is the Devil Fire on the Gasquet District. This fire has burned 19.4 acres and is 100 percent contained, with crews mopping-up and patrolling the perimeter. Most of the other fires are much smaller, many at less than an acre.

“Our fire staff is working hard to get a jump on these fires to keep them small,” said Merv George Jr., Six Rivers National Forest Supervisor. “With the amount of lightning we’ve had, there may be more starts that we just don’t know about yet. Today, we’ll be doing some aerial reconnaissance to pinpoint the location of some of the fires, as well as to see if there are additional fires out there.”

Today’s forecast is calling for above normal temperatures, with thunderstorms developing this afternoon.

Fire restrictions have not yet been implemented on the forest; however, forest visitors should be aware of the fire danger and exercise caution with campfires. A permit is required for any campfire, gas cook stove, or barbeque when outside a developed campground or recreation area. Permits are free and are available at any Six Rivers National Forest office.

Fires are also active on the Klamath, Shasta-Trinity, Modoc and Rogue River-Siskiyou national forests.