The most common view of a severe forest fire is one of destruction, which is misleading. I was lucky to have a forest fire burn close to Missoula, Montana, just before I moved there in 1977 to assume an academic position at the University of Montana. The burned forest was soon filled with plants and birds and insects I had never seen before. The eye-opening environment showed me just how biologically unique burned forests really are. Although I was immediately attracted to the birds in that burned forest, I never anticipated that my entire research career would come to revolve around fire ecology.