MAMMOTH CAVE, Ky. — Mammoth Cave National Park burned 110 acres without a problem under cool, sunny skies in an effort to help bring back trees and plants that thrived there hundreds of years ago.

        “For now, we're trying this on a small scale,” Mammoth Cave ecologist Rick Olsen said. “The goal is to return this area to what settlers would have seen.”

        The fires in the Temple Hill and Flint Ridge areas marked the first time the 53,000-acre park has intentionally set fire to its land, spokeswoman Vickie Carson said.

        “We've been putting fires out, not starting them,” said Rich Caldwell, a park ranger and fire officer.

        Kentuckians can expect to see more “prescribed” fires as state and federal land managers try to combat arson, wildfires and the spread of invasive pests like the pine beetle.

        New federal regulations and a desire to bring back native species are behind the trend. The 2-year-old National Fire Plan has set aside $2.2 billion this year for the work.

        Southern pine beetles have killed an estimated 100,000 acres of pines in the forest, leaving fuel for fires. Forest officials plan to burn about 8,000 acres this year, and that could increase in the future, said Rex Mann, staff fire officer.

        The federal government also is encouraging land managers to restore occasional fires to lands that once depended on them. In the West, periodic naturally occurring forest fires cleared away brush and saplings. In the East, Indians burned the prairie to clear land and flush out game.

        “If you look at the history of fire control in this country, what we have done is take the fire out of systems that depended on it historically,” Mr. Mann said.

        Firefighters from Mammoth Cave, Cumberland Gap National Historical Park and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park worked together to set and control the blazes Tuesday.

        In the Flint Ridge area, near the old Job Corps site, officials burned about 80 acres of grassland to allow native prairie grass to reseed itself, Ms. Carson said.

        “The grasses were 6 or 7 feet high,” Ms. Carson said. “Now the grasses are gone. There's just ash there.”

        Late in the afternoon, officials decided that weather conditions were good enough for a second 30-acre burn, this one in the Temple Hill area. The fire was intended to kill young silver maple trees that are crowding out oak and hickory seedlings. Eventually the park hopes to restore the oak and hickory savannah that thrived there hundreds of years ago.

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