An exceptional wildfire that broke out in Saumos on 22 July 2026 and spread to the edge of Cestas has destroyed around 80 hectares of INRAE forest research infrastructure in Gironde, France, including long-term experiments and unique genetic conservation collections, some monitored for decades.

Among the losses is part of the maritime pine (Pinus pinaster) genetic resources conservatory, holding material from different provenances, alongside experimental plots used to test species mixtures, develop innovative silvicultural approaches, and model tree growth. Several of these sites belonged to reference scientific networks producing knowledge essential for anticipating the impacts of climate change on forests.

INRAE coordinates OptFORESTS, and the destroyed sites are exactly the kind of infrastructure the project exists to strengthen. OptFORESTS will support the effort to rebuild, and ideally to rebuild better: designing a new generation of experimental sites adapted to the questions a changing climate is now raising.

The loss is significant. These were irreplaceable long-term observatories documenting how forests, and the organisms that depend on them, respond to climate change, pests, and multiple environmental pressures at once. Yet INRAE's teams have made clear that the destruction only strengthens their determination to design and establish new infrastructure and continue this essential work.

Thanks to the exceptional efforts of firefighters, the buildings, scientific equipment and more than 300 hectares of further experimental land at the Cestas research site were saved. The site's two arboreta were also largely spared.

Together with INRAE and its partners, OptFORESTS will support the effort to conceive the next generation of experimental infrastructure that forest science needs to meet the scientific and societal challenges of global change.

Read INRAE's full press release (in French):https://www.inrae.fr/actualites/infrastructures-recherche-forestiere-dinrae-detruites-incendies-gironde