burning desire

We have been wanting some additional snow cover so we could burn slash piles on our property.  (Slash is the accumulation of limbs, leaves and pine needles left by natural debris and forest management activities.  Slash piles are created by the accumulation of these materials into small manageable piles that can be burned in a safe manner.  Stolen from the Internet.)

On Wednesday we got about 6" of snow but the County didn't give authorization to burn until Friday when an additional inch fell.  (We are supposed to be able to burn with 3" of snow cover.) We got a permit for Saturday and Sunday to burn small slash piles, no more than 8' diameter at the base.  Saturday looked the best, as high winds were expected on Sunday.

I got started lighting piles about 8:30 am on Saturday.  The lighting process uses a mix of 75% diesel fuel and 25% gasoline, the gasoline allows for ease of lighting the pile.  Actually it was not easy to light the piles and after several attempts I resorted to using an old newspaper soaked in the diesel fuel and gasoline mixture.  It didn't take long and I had four towering infernos!  OK, maybe they weren't towering but I had four good fires going.

After about an hour the piles had burned down a bit so we started adding stumps to the fires.  Carol drove the tractor and operated the loader and I got the stumps into the bucket and then directed Carol where to dump the stumps, aiming for the middle of the fire.

The process for burning stumps requires knocking off the dirt and rocks from the roots with a shovel and turning the stumps occasionally.   This is really hot work!  And you have to keep at it.  I was wearing mechanic's gloves with a Velcro wristband - there is a small hole between the glove and the Velcro that exposes the skin and if I wasn't careful to pull down the sweatshirt sleeve was subject to burning that small spot.  I also had to pull up the hood of the sweatshirt to shield my face as I walked into the fire with the shovel.

The fires burned for the afternoon.  About 4 pm I consolidated the burning material from one of the piles into one of the other piles.  Two other piles I had allowed to burn down to about nothing and using the tractor bladed over the 3 spots leaving only one fire burning.  As the sun was setting I dumped a bunch of snow on the glowing embers of what used to be several big stumps.

It was a good day!

I suffered some 1st degree burns on my face and breathed too much super-heated and smoky air.  I was pretty congested and uncomfortable that evening and over night... every breath of air smelled of smoke.