Burning Down the Farm

Back in late March, before I got sidetracked with the last series of posts, I went down to the farm to help burn the CRP (Crop Reserve Program) acres as we are required by the government in order to receive payments. Periodic burning ensures a healthy stand of native prairie grasses which is good for the land and the inhabitants of the fields and discourages weeds and trees that might otherwise takeover if left untouched. 

In the fall, a protective firebreak is disked around the perimeter of the field. On the day of the burn, we start on the downwind side of the field and start back burning to decrease any fuel and potential of the fire to hop the firebreak. We essentially light a fire a few feet from the disked firebreak and let the wind blow it toward the firebreak where it quickly burns out and we can move on. The upwind side might continue to burn slowly into the wind and increase the size of the blackened area at the end of the field.

Eventually we will both backburn along the sides of the field parallel with the direction of the wind. We pay special attention to potential hazard areas where the fire might jump any firebreak and make sure there is plenty of "black" area of no fuel to prevent that before moving on.

Eventually there is nothing left to do except to set the head fire or the fire on the upwind side of the field. The wind blows it swiftly across the field consuming all debris and hopefully getting hot enough to destroy any tree sprouts or other weeds that might shade out or otherwise compete with the native prairie grasses we are encouraging.  The device in the bottom of the photo is a drip torch which allows us to drip our fuel onto flame which then falls to the ground and ignites the grasses as we walk along. Using it allows us to really control the burn area and cover long distances quickly when needed.

Here is a head fire racing across a field from a different perspective.

After setting the head fire, the show is quickly over within seconds to a minute. All is consumed and all that is left is blackened charred remains of the debris which will add nutrients to the soil. Occasionally above, wet or green areas will get skipped but when conditions are right as they were back then, we got really good burns. Once the head fire is out, we will drive around the perimeter of the field to make sure nothing is still burning and put out any smoldering clumps in case conditions worsen later on in the day. Once we are satisfied, we load up our gear and move onto the next field. We try to burn half the fields every year so all get burned every two years as required and it isn't so hard on us if conditions are poor. This year, though pretty cold, humidity and wind conditions were great and so our burns which fairly well and after two days, we were finished until next spring.

 

Above is a brief video I took of a head fire sweeping across the field. The impressive part approaching me didn't get captured as the smoke evidently obscured my face from the phone and it wouldn't unlock until I manually typed in my code. As a result, I just got a video of the last half of the action but it gives some sense of how quickly it all goes once you light the headfire.