As he drove east of Fresno to the next Wildfire Awareness Week event in Kern County on Wednesday, Cal Fire Chief Ken Pimlott turned his gaze toward the browning landscape.

“I’m looking at grass that’s 2 feet tall easily, and it’s already dead,” Pimlott said. Meanwhile, far away in the southern and central Sierra Nevada, foliage on 29 million trees infested with bark beetles are turning orange and red and dying, with countless more stretching north toward Sacramento expected to meet a similar fate over the next year.