Y’all may not be old enough to remember it but I still do. Hank Williams had a bunch of hits back in the day as his twangy voice sang all sorts of sad love songs, such as ‘I’m so Lonesome I could cry”, “Lovesick Blues”, “Mansion on the Hill”. But he had one that was a jumpy little ditty about taking his girl friendout for a date where they’d be, in the title of the song, “Settin the woods on fire.”
I saw on the news last week about a wildfire in New Jersey where a young man was arrested for doing just that to the forests in his state. He was guilty of “setting the woods on fire”, and I don’t think it was the same sort of fire that old Hank was singing about.
For someone to deliberately set fire to the woods because he has a grudge against a property owner or just has a screw loose and likes to see things burn, that’s some seriously bad stuff. However, there are some who set fire to the woods for a good cause; they’re professional foresters who know how to set a controlled or prescribed fire for the purpose of improving the habitat by removing dead underbrush and duff from the forest floor to allow tender plants that are desirable to grow in place of the no-good stuff.
Retired wildlife official, David Moreland had an article on controlled fire in a recent edition of LA Sportsman magazine that piqued my interest, so I read the article to get more information on the subject of prescribed fire.
Moreland wrote that even Native Americans learned how to use fire for clearing underbrush, opening pasture lands, providing nutrition-rich forage for deer, elk and bison.
Historians today refer to this as “cultural burning”. They knew that fire would clear the grass and brush for villages and camp areas. They also knew that burning to open clearings in the forests would regenerate new plant growth that would attract animals they depended on for food and skins.
Prescribed burning is a tool regularly used by foresters and wildlife managers today. Referred to as “dormant season fires”, these fires can occur in fall and winter, the time when much of the vegetation is in a dormant condition. Prescribed fires done in spring are known as “growing season fires”.
Burning during the growing season comes with more challenges as this time of year is when deer fawns and turkey poults are being born.
Can just any property owner decide on his own to use controlled fire on his property? They can but should fire spread to adjoining property, the landowner may be liable for expenses should he be responsible for damage to timber on a neighbor’s land.
This is why, Moreland writes, “most forest landowners have a consulting forester to help them with their timber management needs.” The state has a program where individuals can become “certified prescribed burners”. This certification is done through the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry, a certification that must be renewed every five years.
Certified prescribed burners know when conditions are best for fire and when a particular stand of timber needs to be controlled burned. Watching for weather conditions, wind speed and direction, humidity and ground moisture all figure into deciding the best time for a fire.
Should you have land that you are considering for a controlled fire, be sure to contact experts before you proceed so that you won’t be “setting the woods on fire” like Hank or doing like that kid in New Jersey.