Ask This Old House

-Today on a special edition of "Ask This Old House," we visit the San Francisco Bay area and show you how to protect your home from wildfires.

First, Jenn helps a homeowner create a welcoming front yard using native plants and a firewise design.

Plus, Richard brings a hungry crew to help a homeowner's overgrown yard.

And wind-swept embers cause catastrophic damage.

Tommy shows a homeowner some simple measures that will harden their home and protect it from future wildfires.

That's all coming up next on "Ask This Old House."

Welcome back to another episode of "Ask This Old House."

Wildfires are one of the most destructive forces on the planet.

Severe drought and a prolonged fire season are making them more frequent and more severe.

Here in the United States, we experience 70,000 wildfires a year ripping through communities, destroying thousands of homes and lives, and costing a staggering $5 billion a year in damage.

No place is more familiar with the devastating effects wildfires can cause than California.

With over 5,000 fires erupting across their landscape each year, they've adapted their building codes and practices to help residents exist with this ever growing threat.

Today, we'll show you how homeowners in the Golden State are safeguarding their homes from future fires.

-With wildfires on the rise in the Bay area, it could be challenging to balance your landscape desires with climate change.

So, I'm here at a local nursery in California to learn about plants that are both beautiful and firewise.

Hey, Josh.

-Hey, Jenn.

Good to meet you.

-Good to meet you too.

I'm so glad we found your nursery because we are... We're working on a project, and we need to be mindful of firescaping, creating defensive spaces around the house.

-Yeah.

-So we need to be mindful and not plant plants that have oils in them that are going to ignite like some evergreens and grasses.

And I think native plants is the way to go.

-Yeah.

-To start the process.

-Yeah.

Natives are obviously what we do.

It's our thing.

We're a native nursery.

One of our big focuses is how you maintain them to make them fire safe.

-And then, you incorporate them into the design.

And it can be just as beautiful as a typical foundation planting.

-I completely agree.

-Well, why don't you give me a tour of all these beautiful species that you have?

-Yeah.

This is one of our most beautiful natives, the California fuchsia.

-I like the color of the foliage and the flower.

-It works really well with the California Gray Rush with that vertical element.

-Yeah, they go really, really well together.

I like the contrast.

-We have our classic California coastal redwood, which gets giant, the biggest tree in the world.

-Gorgeous, gorgeous.

Substantial tree.

So, this project I'm working on in Berkeley, I need a little help, I'm not familiar with all the natives out here.

And if you could recommend some of the plants that I could install.

-Yeah, I'm happy to help.

-Okay, great.

-So, Jenn, here are some plants I thought might work well for your project.

-Okay.

-We have the California coffeeberry.

These little flowers are bee favorites.

-Okay.

-It gets about 4 to 6 feet tall.

Nice and dense.

-Does it grow out that way?

-Yes.

It does.

-Okay.

It looks like it.

-So, it'll get kind of bushy.

-Okay.

-Then we have a manzanita.

You can't have a California garden without a manzanita.

-All right.

-This one's called Austin Griffiths with pink flowers.

Evergreen, looks good all the year.

-So, it's evergreen?

-It is evergreen.

-Fantastic.

-And it blooms in winter.

-Okay.

-Then we have, uh, monkeyflower, often called sticky monkeyflower.

-Okay.

-Beautiful flower.

This is a hybrid.

They come in all different colors.

-Yeah.

-In this particular case, this is one called grape.

But our local form ranges from orange to red.

-They really look like orchids.

-Yeah, they're really beautiful.

Custom designed for hummingbirds.

-Yeah, yeah, yeah.

-Um, beautiful plants.

-And that even makes it better.

So... -[ Laughs ] Yeah.

-It's so cool when a hummingbird swoops in and -- -Yeah.

-It's a moment.

-It's just awesome.

-So, I really like this whole variety.

Like, there's enough color and different texture and shapes and heights, and I think it's going to work well.

I could send you a picture of what it looks like.

And thank you for this amazing tour of this nursery.

I really like what you're doing, and the message you're sending to everyone, it's just -- it's so important.

-Oh, thank you, Jenn.

I loved having you here.

-Oh, fantastic.

-[ Chuckles ] -So, I'm going to just take these.

-[ Laughs ] Sounds good.

Happy planting.

-Yeah.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

-Have a good one.

-Hi, Jamila?

-Yeah!

-Nice to meet you.

-Oh, my gosh.

-Thank you for writing in.

-Thank you so much.

I'm so glad that you're here.

-So nice to be on the West Coast again.

-Oh, awesome.

-So tell me what you're thinking for the front yard.

Well, I want to have native plants, and I want to have a place to sit and hang out with my neighbors.

-Well, I think we could do that.

So, I have a designer who's local, and she's going to help us out.

-Wow.

Thank you so much.

-You're welcome.

Let's go meet her.

This is my friend April Owens.

-So nice to meet you, Jamila.

-Same here.

Same here.

Thank you.

-Before we talk about the design, I want to talk about, like, design principles that you have to use now in California.

-Right, right, well, in 2017, we had these big fires.

And so it really, it made us really think differently about the landscape.

So now we look at this whole umbrella, looking at firewise, drought tolerant, and biodiverse landscapes using native plants.

-Right, so, I mean, those are all key -- key things that pretty much every landscape should think about, right?

-Mm-hm.

Absolutely.

-So how did you apply them here?

What's your game plan?

-Well, we look at the garden from the house out.

So, 0-5 is 0 feet to 5 feet from your home.

And you want to have no plant material in that space.

-Gotcha.

-So that's like keeping plants 5 feet off the foundation for fire embers, but also for firefighters to access if there is a local fire.

Right?

-Mm-hm.

Yeah.

And so, I know you'd asked for a patio or some way to be out here with your neighbors.

So, we're going to do a little patio in the 0 to 5, and then, the 5-30 from your home, you can have islands of native plants or plants separated by some hardscape.

-That makes sense.

Being native, the plants are going to adapt better to the situation, because they're supposed to be here.

-Just what I'm looking for.

Thank you.

-So beginning this project, I imagine we're going to have to take the bougainvillea and the flax out, right?

-Yes, yes.

-So, shovel time, girl.

-Shovel time.

[ Rock music plays ] -All right, so now we finished clearing the front yard, and we have the patio laid out over here.

I want to talk about materials, you want to walk us through, in the plan, what you're thinking.

-Yeah, so instead of landscape fabric, we use compacted base rock.

And we do about 3 inches of that.

And then, we're going to do about a half an inch of the crushed Trinity Rock.

-Okay.

-And we use this cobble kind of to accent around the landscape.

-Okay, we call cobble like solid granite cobblestones back east.

So, I would call that river stone.

But I love that accent around the patio.

What are we going to do with the boulders?

-The boulders are going to kind of set the scene with some soil out here.

So, we're going to bring in soil and mound it up and level it out, so, it looks all natural.

And then, put the boulders in to make it more interesting and creative versus just, you know... -Absolutely.

Yeah.

-...just nothing.

And then, the boulders will kind of accent some of these wonderful shrubs that we have, like the manzanita which is great for hummingbirds.

-Right.

The coffeeberry.

Is that right?

I love how that's going to grow.

It's so pretty.

-Yes.

-Yeah.

And then, we have the eyebrow grass.

So, it's really sweet.

It looks like little eyebrows.

-And then, the sun catches that.

-Perfect.

-Just another element in the landscape.

-Uh-huh.

Mm.

-Let's do this.

-And then, we're just going to tamp it in.

-Is this called crushing it?

-Yep.

That's so crushing it.

Tighten the core.

-I think we're gonna try to go right to the edge of the steel header, so it's not a tripping hazard.

[ Country music plays ] [ Grunting ] -Okay.

That's close.

-And then, we'll lay out the plants.

-Natives are more likely to stay hydrated in the drought.

The key to less burn ability is to be more hydrated.

-And how deep does it go?

-Well, look at your plant, and that's the depth you want to go.

So, I take it, and then, flip it over and catch it.

Take the top off.

This.

I'm going to go like this.

Loosen that up just a little bit.

And you want the top of the plant to be level with that soil.

Then, we backfill it.

Yes.

-My neighbors are going to be so excited.

-Uh, hello?

-Hello.

-This is amazing.

Oh, hello.

Hello.

This is an incredible use of space.

You know, it makes sense.

The 0-5 foot zone.

It's functional.

Now you have a place to sit.

But this mounded landscape, it just adds a little bit of privacy.

You just need to keep it watered.

Really?

Right?

Do you have any instructions?

-A few days a week with a deep soak.

Just come out here with that sprinkler, and then you get to know the plants better as you're out here, and you can see the butterflies and the birds come and just watch everything grow.

-Right.

So cheers to that.

-Thank you.

-All right.

-Cheers.

-Great job on the design, April.

-Thank you, Jenn.

-Fantastic education.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

-Yes.

-I've often heard Jenn talk about how improperly maintained landscape can actually contribute to the spread of wildfire.

You know, overgrowth can act like a tinder to really make that fire spread, and clearing out some of that overgrowth can be a big job and hard work, but it can be outsourced.

We found a team that really loves this job.

I'm not kidding.

You must be Marshall.

-Hey.

Great to finally meet you.

-It's my great pleasure.

So you wrote us about your backyard?

-Yes, I did, it has gotten completely out of control.

Let's take a look.

-All right.

-We moved in this place about 10 years ago.

You could literally see everything here.

-None of this brush was here.

-None of it was here.

None at all.

We had a beautiful deck up there.

This staircase.

You know, you were able to walk up to the deck and see the entire view of the city, but now it's just gotten really bad.

-It has gotten pretty far ahead of you.

So, I see that we've done a little prep work for the team that's on its way.

Let's see if they're here yet.

Say hello to your new best friends for the next week.

-Wow, look at that.

-They're going to clean up your backyard.

-Ooh.

I'm excited.

-Look at that.

[ Country music playing ] So, Genevieve, we've met your beautiful goats.

Tell us about this process.

It's so fascinating.

-So, we are a nonprofit.

We've been in existence for about 11 years.

We've been a nonprofit since 2017, and we take goats all over San Francisco and a little bit beyond to do exactly what they're doing here, eat the vegetation on our hillsides and our fields.

The goats will be here for about a week.

They're just going to eat as much as they can.

-How much will they get of this, all that we see right here?

-They'll get to about 60 or 70% of what you can see right now.

A lot of the native plants benefit from a heavy pruning, kind of like roses do, but there are some plants that they won't eat.

So, and sometimes that's a happy circumstance.

We have a lot of bottle brush on this hillside, which is toxic to them, but they know to not eat it.

It doesn't taste good, but they're going to eat the ivy.

They're going to eat the Himalayan blackberry.

They're going to eat the invasive fennel that's on the hillside.

-Mostly invasive.

Good.

-Yes, the seeds will actually get sterilized as they pass through the goat's digestive system.

-So what are the benefits to using goats over landscape crew?

-Well, #1, personality.

-There you go.

-They're so much more fun to watch, right?

-Oh, landscapers smile too.

[ Laughter ] -But they also take a whole loop out of the carbon cycle.

Basically, you're not hauling all of this away, and then, processing it elsewhere.

You're doing all of your composting directly on site through the goat.

So, you're feeding your microorganisms in the soil, and you're creating a stable base that prevents erosion and that also increases your fertility in the soil when you want to put in new plantings.

So, all the way around, it's just a definite win.

-Where do you get all the goats from?

-They kind of come from all over.

We have some that people tried to have as pets, but they weren't zoned for goats as pets.

And so, they call us and say, "Hey, we have to get rid of these.

We've got complaints from the neighbors."

So we take in some in that way.

We also take in a lot of male goats who would otherwise go into the meat industry, that are coming out of the dairy industry.

-So is there anything special I have to do while they're here?

-You have to make sure their water tub is full and hang out with them a little bit, socialize with them a little bit, enjoy them while they're here, because they're so much fun to watch.

-Oh, yeah.

-You might want to sing to them too.

-Oh, I could do a little of that.

-Hey, we've had clients who sat out on their deck and played guitar for the goats.

So, you know, they're expecting a concert, but... -Well, they certainly seem happy.

They are voracious eaters.

-They do stop.

You'll see them.

They'll all just lay down at the same time of day, about twice a day, and just chill out.

-Is that like a siesta?

-It is like a siesta.

It is like a union break because they'll all stop at once.

It's really fun on the bigger properties where we'll have 70 or 80 goats.

About 10 a.m., everybody just lays down like a bell was rung, and then, they'll all chill out and rest.

And it kind of depends on the weather how long they rest.

The warmer and sunnier it is, the longer they rest.

And on those hot days, they'll get up and eat in the middle of the night.

-Yeah, I do that too.

-Yeah.

Exactly.

Just like us.

Right?

[ Laughter ] -Genevieve, thank you so much.

This is a really cool solution.

-Thank you so much.

Lovely to meet you.

-It was great.

-Thanks for having us here.

-Hi, Misha.

-Hi.

Nice to meet you.

-Nice to meet you.

I'm Tom.

So you wrote us about fire hardening your house, making it more safe in cases of fire.

What's going on?

-Yes.

We were really impacted by the 2017 fire.

We could actually see it from this ridge right up over here.

Actually, I have a photo I can show you.

-Oh, really?

-Yeah.

Um, we were standing right in this spot, and you can see right up on that ridge, you can see, like, little embers.

-Oh, my gosh, there's flames right there.

-Yeah, it was pretty scary.

-I can actually smell smoke right now.

-Yep, unfortunately, that's something we have to deal with nowadays.

Just, um, a fact of life around here, but, um, we just kind of do what we can.

And that's why we called you, because we want to figure out what we can do to protect our house in case it ever gets that close again.

-Right, I don't know if you're aware that we did a story a few years back about that fire up in Paradise.

I did a segment with a company that demonstrates how they harden homes against wildfires.

Oh, wow.

Look at that.

-As you can see... -And someone from the company is actually working on your home right now.

All right, so Nate's over there working away.

How's it going, Nate?

-Oh.

Hey there.

It's going good.

-Hi, Misha.

Nice to meet you.

-Hi, Misha.

I'm Nate.

-Tom.

So tell me what's going on.

-Well, we are hardening this home.

Right now, I'm currently working on the vents, but there's a few other things that need to occur.

Uh, just trying to get ready for the fire season.

-Yeah, so we've done our roof, and those vents are, you know, up to more recent code and more protective from embers getting in.

-Roof is a good place to start.

That's generally where the embers will hit first -- That and the foundation.

So you want to make sure that all vents on the home are fire and ember safe.

Most people think that during a wildfire event, this big scary flame wall, you know, attacks the buildings.

And it does, but long before that, those fires are generating embers by the trillions, and they're blowing everywhere.

So the number one threat to structure loss during wildfire events is wind-blown embers.

You want to think about it like you're a little ember.

Fire needs three things to live.

It needs fuel, heat, and oxygen.

An ember is two of those things.

It's its own little fuel source.

It's its own little heat source.

It lands.

It already has everything it needs.

It transfers its heat to those dry leaves in the gutter, to the dead weeds underneath the house, cardboard boxes in the attic.

Right, so thinking about it from that perspective can help you harden your home better, right?

If I was an ember, how would I get in?

We're starting on the foundation back here, and then, we'll move to the rest of the house.

-Sounds good.

-Sounds good.

All right, Nate, how do these vents work?

-There's two main parts to this vent.

The back of the vent is a 304 stainless steel mesh.

Very simply, it blocks embers for the life of the vent.

No activation required.

Repeatedly blocks embers.

The inside of the vent is a honeycomb aluminum material with an intumescent coating, meaning that it reacts to heat.

At imminent failure, when this reaches 450 to 500 degrees, the vent will actually puff up with a carbon layer and seal the vent shut, allowing the building material to fend off the flames.

You don't want a hole in your building when there's a fire outside, right?

-So, when that pops up, it stops all the embers?

-No, the back of the vent, the stainless steel mesh, that blocks embers.

The honeycomb intumescent material, that's for radiant heat and flame.

-So, that's if the flames like right under the vent?

Like you have flame right along your house?

This is going to keep it from getting inside?

-Exactly.

That's your last ditch effort.

But prior to that, when the fire's miles away, and there's embers flying around catching things on fire, this vent will just easily block embers, because of the stainless steel mesh.

-Interesting.

-Yeah.

-All right, so what do we do now?

-The first thing we did was we got a standard foundation vent.

Now for the fire caulking.

-That's really to seal the air around that flange so no embers can get in there.

-That's exactly right.

Yeah.

You want to make sure there's no gaps.

-Pretty cool.

-You get your fasteners.

-So what do you have next, Nate?

-Next is gutter guards.

Gutters can fill up full of leaves.

They become dry.

Instant tinder bundle during a wildfire event.

Place these on top of the gutter.

It keeps leaves out.

Water can still penetrate this because of the raised pattern, high performance, high flow, ignition resistant, and does a great job of keeping your gutters clean.

-I think that little pattern also gives the wire some strength and rigidity.

-Yeah, it also breaks surface tension of the water.

-Ah.

-So this is a micro mesh.

It's not only aesthetically pleasing, but it's functional.

-So, how would I maintain my gutters now that I have a guard on it?

I don't obviously have to clean them out.

Is there anything special I need to do with these now when they're installed?

-In the event that there's some litter that could accumulate on the top that's not blown off by the wind, a little sweep and you're done.

-Sounds easy.

-Pretty easy to maintain.

-Yeah, definitely.

-So they look like about 5 or 6 inches for that size gutter.

But how do you install them onto the gutter?

-There's two edges.

There's a beaded edge.

-Yep.

-It's got a little trim on it.

Lift the shingle, place it under the shingle.

This snaps to the front of the gutter, edge of the gutter.

Three fasteners.

-Well, that was simple enough.

-On to the next run.

This is ember mesh.

It's a 304 stainless with a fine powder coating.

Give it a little bit more resilience.

We're going to skirt this deck out.

Underneath decks is a great place for embers to hide.

-I noticed that it's much heavier than a screening wire that I would use in like a storm window or something like that.

-It is a bit heavier.

You want it to have some structural integrity, so it's not easily kicked in or deforming.

You want it to stand up.

We're going to bury the edge of it so it can stay in place.

-Okay.

Nate, I gotta say, it looks good.

All the vents are in, even the gable vent.

You did a good job.

-Yeah, it's looking really good.

-Yeah.

Thank you, Tommy and Nate, so much.

I feel a lot of relief having this piece of the fire hardening all finished and so secure.

-It's hard to believe that these simple little measures can protect the house the way they do.

-Yeah, and we've seen it in action.

Right, there's a house in Paradise, California that comes to mind, there was a fire, of course.

And they had gutter guards.

They had vents.

They had done their landscaping.

And they have a home today.

But all the homes around this one particular home, unfortunately, were lost, so we know it works.

I'm really happy that you did it.

Maybe you can spread the word throughout the neighborhood.

-Absolutely, the more everybody does it, the more neighborhoods are protected.

And hopefully nobody loses their house to a fire.

-Yeah.

-And we all learned a lesson.

We sure did.

-Great job, everybody.

-Thank you, Nate.

-Thank you so much.

-All right.

-Next time on "Ask This Old House."

-So, this is our pool area.

-Oh, this is an awesome space.

-Nathan finds a solution for a sunny pool area that could use a little shade.

Plus, we highlight two brothers who are carrying on the legacy of their great grandfather's fourth-generation landscaping business.

And Mark helps a landlord make some safety improvements to her tenant's cracked concrete walkway.

All that on "Ask This Old House."