Bonfires & Burn Piles

I don't know about the rest of you, but Spring & Early Summer is the time when I get out and trim back the trees. At our home we have probably 1000 trees so we get some pretty big piles of branches and debris. Way to much to try to "chip" with my little chipper.

So we build up big piles and burn them. 3 good fires so far this year. Each started out with a pile of wood about 10' in diameter. I use the front end loader to crush the branches down to a manageable 6 to 8' tall. Pour on a gallon of diesel (because this is green wood), and light it up.

Of course, since we are worried about Global Warming, we only burn them on the cool days or we wait until the evenings when the temps have dropped. That way the heat we generate from the fire is offset by the cooler evening temperatures

Outright burning of trash is not legal, not even in the countryside. We always have a single hot dog on a stick at the ready. We are allowed to cook over a campfire!!!

My grandfather had a camp tucked back in the woods and every summer we would do the same thing. Uproot undesirable small trees, prune etc. And we would also build them into big brush piles in more open areas of the woods. But we would always wait until winter when their was a few inches of snow on the ground to burn them up. And you know it was a nice warm toasty way to spend a winter afternoon.

I have a big pile ready to burn now that things are green and we finally got some rain.

I don't know but Skurka, wood, diesel fuel and matches combined scare me.


Keep in mind Bob at least in our area you can have a fire for cooking and entertainment but a larger bonfire is not acceptable without a permit. I think we have a limit of the size of fire. However I have a fire permit, good for one year and I can burn all I want off that permit. And get this, The permit was free. When I burn, I call this special number (fire department) and they tell me if I can burn or not. Pretty simple


murph

We have burned over 200 slash piles in the past few years clearing, cleaning and thinning our mountain properties. The snow is over 5 foot deep around this very large pile which I burned this past winter/spring. It burned/smoldered for almost two weeks and I have enough leftovers for another good slash fire around the perimeter for this winter.

Bet you need a LOOONNNNGGGGG Hot Dog stick for that! Niiiiiice fire.

Each time we burn here, we have to call for a permit #. It's free, but allows DNR to track fires and smog levels.

I don't get the snow like topper....then again only a few here do...I do mine at the end of spring/beginning of summer during the rainy season. I've got one planned for sometime before the end of the month. No permits needed. Just have to check to be sure there aren't any bans in effect.

After my parents bought their place out by the lake years ago, there was allot of trees to trim and brush to burn. We made a huge pile much like the ones above. We had flames shooting up 20 feet high or so. The funny part was that the summer forest fire fighting crews were based less then 1/4 mile away from their place at the time. We had choppers, birddog places, and cl-415's buzzing overhead trying to bomb us with water.

I've done the big brush piles like MtnTopper. I always burn when it's wet out. Some diesel always seems to get things started. You have to have a burn permit but it is free.

Burn barrels are illegal but both my neighbor and I have one. My neighbor burns a lot of his garbage in his. I just burn the occasional small amount of stuff.

I have neighbors that always seem to do their burning when it is hot and sunny out and the wind is blowing towards our house. I hate that because you can't leave the windows open.