I was recently in Fort Benton, Montana on the Upper Missouri River. I talked to a local Rancher who was really upset by the fact that one of his bottoms had burned. Burned bad enough to kill all the very large cottonwood trees.
How long does it take a bottom to recover from this? I realize the large trees will take many years (maybe hundreds?). What consequences for the local ecology? How long before some underbrush returns? How bad is it for the game populations? Deer and Pheasents?
