We had a wonderful garden last year, full of tomatoes, beans, peppers, corn, watermelon, and cantaloupe. Â With the weather warming up, we’re preparing to start again.
But, the winter was unkind to the garden and it was a big mess of dry weeds and grass. Â How to begin?
Weed-eat it? Â Mow it? Â Till the soil and grass together?
Thankfully, our wise neighbor Mr. Fesperman showed up. Â He’s lived across the street for decades, everyone knows and respects him, and he owns about 200 acres of land.
Burn it.
My response: Â Really? Â Are you sure? Â I mean, is it safe? Â How do we control it?? Â What if it gets OUT of control? Â And, what if…
Randy’s response: Â Now, where did I put those lighter sticks…
He started the darn thing before I was even down there to help! Â What was he thinking?!?
And, notice that Randy is IN the fence. Â Counting on the wind to blow the fire AWAY from him and down the garden.
Did I mention he had ONE hose? Â The rest of us were watching like hawks, yelling “hey, over here!” and “watch that left side!” and “Oh, oh, it’s coming this way!!”
I was amazed at how fast the fire swept through. Â Obviously, the wind helped it along. Â At one point, the wind turned and was blowing the OTHER way, but it switched back quickly. Â Yes, I was nervous.
Right about now, Randy yells “I can’t see a thing”. Â Oh good, cause it’s not like seeing anything would be HELPFUL right now!!
See Randy behind all that smoke?
Almost to the end…
And, finished.
After he sprayed it well to make sure nothing else was smoldering, he let it sit a while to cool off.
Then, it was time to do the first pass with the tiller.
So, the moral of the story is…
Randy can handle himself when it comes to fires.
Burning the garden is definitely the quickest way to a freshly tilled garden.
And, always listen to Mr. Fesperman.
April 4th, 2013 at 12:01 am
My Daddy would be so proud of Randy, though he might not have advised staying inside the smoke! My brother-in-law, on the other hand, would be “instructing” him about the necessity of having more than one source of water to protect surrounding land and structures.
Sounds like your neighbor is a good person to know.
April 4th, 2013 at 5:38 pm
Too bad your former “Garner Volunteer Fireman” Dad wasn’t there to help him. I, on the other hand, would have been in a panic, just like you!! Your dad starts fires here and keeps the hose available and I am hoping it’s not a windy day. I had all the faith that Randy would burn just the garden and not other things…and he did.
Now onto “farmer work” now that “fireman” work is out of the way!!!
We were there last year right after you guys planted stuff….it looks much bigger in the next-to-the-last photo.
I agree with Linda….Mr. Wyatt is a good person to know…he’s wise from experience.
I can just taste those delish red tomatoes now…with some Miracle Whip…Mmmmmmmm!!!
April 5th, 2013 at 12:11 am
Please just tell me that Randy didn’t use gas to start the fire !! Pleaseeeeeeeeee. When Paul had the wholesale floral business, we had boxes to burn every week and it used to scare me when we would do that seeing as how we live in the woods. I don’t even burn leaves anymore. At least Randy had water available to control burn.
April 5th, 2013 at 9:15 pm
That makes me glad I live in a place that doesn’t allow outdoor fires (except for the charcoal grill, of course) because it really scares me. I will never forget the time when my brother-in-law (at the time) was helping his brother burn off some property in Texas. They were using gasoline because it was a big area. If I remember correctly, he still had the gas can in his hand when the wind blew the fire back and he was badly burned and in the hospital a long time. It would have been a good idea to have had more than one hose hooked up when Randy was burning the garden. Maybe this year Randy should try cutting everything back as much as he can at the end of the season and tilling the rest into the soil to decay during the winter.
April 7th, 2013 at 6:45 pm
The garden area cleaned up so nice after the fire! I’m glad you were able to document the burning with photos!
Happy Spring!
April 9th, 2013 at 11:19 am
First of all . . . that was awesome. ALWAYS listen to Mr. Fesperman. Secondly, just to ease minds, there was no gasoline involved, just a healthy amount of really dry grass and weeds. Did I mention that it was awesome? Did an amazing job of clearing the garden, while scorching the new weeds and grass trying to make an encore appearance this year.
Yay fire !