This past weekend was the end of my spring break. So after a trip to Florida to judge a show, over sleeping and missing my first flight and about 400 students from all over coming for the V8 workout, I was just wanting to take it easy for the remainder of Spring Break '09. With the rain that we had at the beginning of the week our "burn ban" was lifted for a narrow window and Luann decided that we should burn all of the brush piles around the ranch. So Jim, Luann, Sam(the dog), and I all head out out with matches, papers, and rakes on the mule to set some piles ablaze.
Let me do a little backtracking. I was initially mowing Jim and Luann's yard when they started the first fire in the ditch. There was a bunch of old dead grass that was in a row from where it had been mowed. So Jim thought that he would start the ditch on fire and get rid of all that old dead grass. I noticed the clouds of smoke racing towards me since I was down wind from the ditch and thought "Oh great, here we go!"
So he came back from the ditch and picked me and his lovely bride up at the house. We head out to the different piles around the ranch start to set them on fire. My favorite part of fire starting is finding a stick that is on fire and stabbing it deep into a fire ant bed or writing my name with a stick that is smoking. It may seem a little childish but I still like to do it.
Let me do a little backtracking. I was initially mowing Jim and Luann's yard when they started the first fire in the ditch. There was a bunch of old dead grass that was in a row from where it had been mowed. So Jim thought that he would start the ditch on fire and get rid of all that old dead grass. I noticed the clouds of smoke racing towards me since I was down wind from the ditch and thought "Oh great, here we go!"
So he came back from the ditch and picked me and his lovely bride up at the house. We head out to the different piles around the ranch start to set them on fire. My favorite part of fire starting is finding a stick that is on fire and stabbing it deep into a fire ant bed or writing my name with a stick that is smoking. It may seem a little childish but I still like to do it.
We had a couple of big piles that were pushed up against old rotten trees. One tree was really tall like over 50 feet tall. It was rotten the whole was through the middle, so when the flames started going up in there smoke was coming out of the top and it was pretty cool to look at. This tree will be more important later.
So once we got all the piles burning, we had to go back and rake the sticks back to the center of the pile so they would burn the rest of the way. Well I was keeping my eye on the fence line/ditch that Jim started burning to begin with. The smoke just kept bellowing up and you could tell the fire was moving on down the ditch. I was thinking that maybe we should go check that but I was not going to say anything. Well after we get about 5 piles re-raked Jim says that he thinks we should go look at the ditch and see how it is going. Upon our arrival we notice that the fire was a little out of control. There were about five posts that were on fire and burned all the way through. This is when we dispatched our V8 Ranch Volunteer Firefighters division consisting of Fire Chief Jim and Assistant Chief Luke. Our fire truck was the mule and our hose was a sprayer on the back that was used to spray thistle and other weeds. Well this was like going to a gun fight with a cap pistol. Chief Jim would drive along the fence and I was in the back seat with my high pressure sprayer. This baby would really put out the water. I mean I could probably take off running and put off more sweat than this sprayer could. So with my tinker-toy of a sprayer and Chief Jim driving we go along the fence and put out all of the fence posts. Or so we thought. You may be asking yourself, "Where is Luann?" Well she got tired and after about 45 minutes of burning sticks, she wanted to go back to the house. Keep in mind that this was HER project and SHE was the one that wanted to start it.
So once we got all the piles burning, we had to go back and rake the sticks back to the center of the pile so they would burn the rest of the way. Well I was keeping my eye on the fence line/ditch that Jim started burning to begin with. The smoke just kept bellowing up and you could tell the fire was moving on down the ditch. I was thinking that maybe we should go check that but I was not going to say anything. Well after we get about 5 piles re-raked Jim says that he thinks we should go look at the ditch and see how it is going. Upon our arrival we notice that the fire was a little out of control. There were about five posts that were on fire and burned all the way through. This is when we dispatched our V8 Ranch Volunteer Firefighters division consisting of Fire Chief Jim and Assistant Chief Luke. Our fire truck was the mule and our hose was a sprayer on the back that was used to spray thistle and other weeds. Well this was like going to a gun fight with a cap pistol. Chief Jim would drive along the fence and I was in the back seat with my high pressure sprayer. This baby would really put out the water. I mean I could probably take off running and put off more sweat than this sprayer could. So with my tinker-toy of a sprayer and Chief Jim driving we go along the fence and put out all of the fence posts. Or so we thought. You may be asking yourself, "Where is Luann?" Well she got tired and after about 45 minutes of burning sticks, she wanted to go back to the house. Keep in mind that this was HER project and SHE was the one that wanted to start it.
After this we head back to the piles burning around the ranch and start our re-raking procedure. In the distance we can hear sirens and they seem to be coming closer. We don't think anything of it because we just extinguished the posts and the other piles were all almost out. Well as it turns out, the post were not put out and flamed back up after we left and the ACTUAL fire department was en route to come put them out. I don't know who called them but about 10 trucks showed up and it looked like we installed a fountain at the entrance to the ranch. Of course I think that we put out most of it and they just had to come back and put a few little flare ups out. Kind of like the theory when someone "loosens the lid" of a jar that cannot be opened.So now that all of the fires are either burned out or put out by the fire department we head back and start to get ready to go eat dinner. After dinner we come back to look at that old rotten tree that we set on fire. This was one of the coolest things that I have ever seen. The entire tree was covered in embers and gave off an orange glow. None of the tree had fallen so the tree looked like a glow-in-the-dark figure that Stephen King would illustrate in his novels. As we were watching the burning tree it would give off sparks that would look like fireworks. Catherine, Jim, Luann, and I all watched this tree for over two hours. We were going to leave after about 20 minutes but as soon as we put the car into drive a HUGE branch fell off and erupted into flames.
From looking on Facebook, I noticed that many people go to Vegas, the Caribbean, or take a road trip with friends, but I would have to say that my last spring break was the most action packed one yet. Keep checking back because today Rachel came in with 5 bags of Easter egg candies and yes that is 100% blog material.
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1 comments:
We had a similar incident to yours. We live out in the county (what used to be considered the country) and a few weeks ago my cousin graduated from the Houston Fire Academy. We have a yearly bon fire to get rid of that years burnable trash. This year it was pretty large. Well it had been burning no longer than 30 minutes and the Sheriff pulls up. He said he called the closest fire dept and they were on the way. Mind you we are pretty far out in the pasture. They pull up with three brush trucks, a pumper truck, a ladder truck, two more deputies, and an EMS vehicle. They informed us that you can not burn within 5000 ft of the city limits. The vehicle seemed a little excessive in my view. I think they just must have been really bored. They did such an excellent job the fire burned for a whole week after. If they would have left it alone it would have been done by morning.
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