When you have a tree farm, there are lots of greens, branches and trunks to contribute to a burn pile. If you don’t burn your pile down, it just gets bigger and bigger. Two times this past winter, we had a great plan to light the pile while we cut greens for wreaths so that we could enjoy the heat of the fire to stay warm. No match would get this pile to light, and, yes, we even added gasoline… it would not light.
When a pile gets so big, it’s unsightly and we knew this pile had to go. The next marker was May 15 when the burn ban was lifted. Yes! This was our moment to light the pile and tidy up our field. We were having a couple family members over to enjoy the slow burning fire. Bill had a separate pile that was smaller for us to start the burn with and, honestly, we were just hoping it would finally light. Let me assure you, it did!
Bill and the boys headed down with the big tractor to get the fire going before our family came while I prepped a few snacks at the house. We already had tables and chairs set up in the field to have a fun, relaxing evening. I looked once in the field and saw the small pile lit – a great sight. A few minutes later, I looked again and the big pile was also lit, “strange” I thought and why is Bill calling the house phone?
“Get down here with the Gater and the water!” he yelled through the phone and I dashed out of the house. As I drove down in a flurry, Bill was coming up with the boys to get more supplies. When I looked around, not only were both piles in full blown fire with billowing smoke, the fire was running along the dry grass as quickly as it could and even started spreading to the nearby woods. I looked at this water tank I had in the back of the Gator and realized I had absolutely no idea how to turn it on and have water shoot out. It seemed so ridiculous!
What seemed like 10 minutes later (was really like 120 seconds) Bill and the boys returned and got the little water tank running. In the mean time, my mother came for the fun. She walked down to the field looking cute and carrying her box of wine. As she got closer, she realized the panic we were in. Smoke was so thick at times that I could’t see where the boys were (scary!) and the fire was spreading fast. In the end, we got the fire out and the big hideous burn pile is gone, but not without a tremendous amount of fear!
In this story, I’m thankful for Jake, my 10 year old, for filling the water tank earlier that day and plugging it into the Gator to get it working. I’m thankful for my mom who ran back to the house in her flip flops to throw shovels and boots in her corvette and drive it down in the field. And I’m thankful to my brother and his family for being a few minutes late and missing all of the action. In all this chaos, we realized the fire burned so hot and so fast, this huge pile was virtually burned out in only 30 minutes!