An acre of our land just burned.

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Came home today to see a bunch of firemen all over our place. Guess the neighbor was burning some brush, caught his yard on fire, which then spread to our land.

I think about an acre burned.

A bunch of pics are here:

On the one hand, it certainly sucks to have an acre go up in smoke. On the other hand, I’m not using this particular acre for anything. It’s just full of thorny plants, tall grass, small trees. So I guess it didn’t hurt me any.

The main thing that pissed me off was the fire trucks. All these years I’ve been very careful not to drive anything heavy over our leech bed. Two small fire trucks drove right over it. I wonder if any of the pipes broke. :frowning:

2

Field fires are scary, glad you didn’t suffer too much damage

We had a field fire a long time ago back at the old family farm, back in the late 1970’s, I was riding on Dad’s lap in our old Case 222 garden tractor, mowing a path around the edge of our 50 acres of land, we were down near the marsh, when some dried grass balled up around the right front tire

now, the old Case 222 had one glaring design flaw, the muffler came out of the right front side of the tractor and was positioned a few inches from the front tire, the grass touched the muffler and instantly caught fire!, we backed the tractor away from the fire, and Dad tried to stomp it out, but it was spreading fast, and growing at an exponential rate…

We hopped back on the tractor, and hightailed it as fast as the tractor could go (no, the 222 was never known for it’s speed, it probably topped off well under 10 MPH, but needless to say, we raced that little 222 as fast as it could go, back up to the house

I remember looking behind me as we raced up the middle of the property as fast as that old Kolher twin cylinder engine could go, and that sight would be forever…burned… into my mind…

We were being chased by ribbons and sheets of vivid orange flame, I could feel the heat from the fire reddening my face (and this was during the heights of summer) it was getting close, I really started to fear for my life, the tractor wasn’t exactly the fastest thing out there…

thankfully, we got back up to the house, and ran inside, the fire was licking at the edge of the field, as we went to run inside the house, the fire department pulled up and somehow extinguished the massive blaze, at that point, the whole situation was a blur, I remember running up to my room, and hiding under the covers, I didn’t want the fire to get me… (ahh, the logic of youth)

the next day, I went to look at the field, and it looked like a wasteland, I’d say at least 20-30 acres had burned, but somehow it stopped just near the edge of the field, it never made it to our lawn or the house, thank Og…

a few weeks later, there was a new Case 224 garden tractor in the gararge, the 224 fixed the major flaw of the 222 (which was an unreliable piece of crap anyway), the muffler was inside the hood of the tractor, hmm, I wonder why…

3

Now would be a good time to buy a buttload of wild flower seeds suitable for your area and sow them. Mix it in with a seed spreader full of sand and get too it.

I think it would be well worth your money and time.

4

Hmm. Interesting idea.

5

It’s hard to get an idea of the size of it from your pictures. On the plus side, you have a blank slate for whatever you want to plant there. I have no idea what you would want to do with that. I actually tried to get a small brushfire going in September, but the damned thing wouldn’t light. Here is a picture of my attempt. That grass behind the fire is eight feet tall. I don’t know what kind of grass my lawn is, but apparently if you don’t mow it all year it gets eight feet tall. The stuff is thick like bamboo at the base. Actually, I’m guessing the lawn isn’t mostly that grass, but that’s what takes over if it isn’t mowed.

We did at one point have it start running away from us on the mowed section of the lawn. That was a little more excitement than I needed.

6

Wow! Glad it wasn’t anything important.

In Jan I came home to find a neighbor’s yard burning. I wasn’t sure it wasn’t *supposed *to be, but I called 911 anyway. It really looked to me like it was close to getting out of hand.

Later I found out that the lady of the house had taken ashes from the fireplace outside and then gone to work - only to find that there were still some embers.

The neighbor lady did thank me once she found out it was me who called.

7

About as mundane and pointless as they get, but:

Any pictures that show a fuller extent of the damage? I’m really a sucker for scenes of widespread destruction (weird like that) and an expanse of freshly-charred, ashy land would be an awesome addition to my collection.

That wildflower idea is excellent, too - I wish I had some fields that burned!
sorta

8

I can say with certainty that my depatment doesn’t are about the leach field, just the septic tank location. If a truck did break leach pipe, that’s a valid claim against your homeowner’s policy because of the fire.

I like the wildflower seed idea, too. Do it quick, because Mother Nature will fix it soon enough on her own if you let it slide.

9

I knew a woman here who tried to burn some dried grass in her yard because she thought it would make new grass grow in faster. The fire raced across the lawn and shot up a tree. She grabbed the hose and put it out before it could spread beyond her property, but the tree was a total loss.

I was a bit surprised when she told me this story. She’d lived in New Mexico all her life and should have known how dangerous it is to mess around with fire during the dry season in the Southwest.

10

I know exactly what this looked like. If a good wind catches it, it races even across a mowed lawn. For us, things were still pretty wet, but obviously not wet enough to stop the green lawn from catching. I’ll definitely check the forecast for wind next time I try to light a grass fire.