US President George W. Bush declared a state of emergency in California on Saturday and ordered federal aid to help authorities battle more than 1,000 wildfires burning out of control. "We have over 1,000 fires burning in northern California alone, our resources are stretched extremely thin," said Cheri Patterson, a spokeswoman for the state's fire department, Calfire. "Our biggest concern is we don't have any of the fires under control," she told and welcomed the federal resources ordered by Bush. The state's more than 12,000 firefighters have been battling the fires, many of which were sparked by lightning from dry thunderstorms, for more than a week now, stretched thin by the sheer number of blazes.