Prescribed Burns Spring 2026

Seth Andrews, round one of spring burns 2026.

Spring burns 2026 included approximately 40 acres of tallgrass prairie. Roughly 30 acres were established three years ago and had fairly strong stands of prairie. The burns did not start until May 3rd which compromises some of the habitat benefits in the short-term but should also set back non-native grasses and invasives. Burn team for round one was Paul Mosely, Seth Andrews and Kevin Lair. Round two was Kevin Lair and round three was Logan Allen, Seth Andrews and Kevin Lair. The burns concluded on May 10th.

Firelines

Setting and managing the fire lines is key to the success of the burn. The fire lines have to follow the planned direction of the wind, the conditions of the fire breaks and the people and resource managing the breaks.

Biodiversity

There are some incidents of unfortunate clashed with wildlife but they are rare. In nearly a decade of burns only a couple of nests, a couple of snakes and a frog have been caught in the fire. However, the prairie creates invaluable habitat.

Collaboration

Burns involve the community. All burns are called into the county dispatch, neighbors are notified and some neighbors pitch in to the burn team effort. Our young feline male companion Roo deseprately wanted to be part of the burn team too.

May 3rd, 2026 CRP Burn field (year 3 contractual management)

Prep for the burn on May 3rd included various issues with the sprayers. The fuses, hoses, nozzles and batteries are all susceptible to issues at any time. We prepped for drone flyover and deployed two UTVs and one ATV to the field with three backpack blowers, drip torch, fuel, hand tools, 4 sprayers. The sprayers were not used during the burn but provide key backup and also insurance depending on what might catch on fire.

Weather conditions for May 3rd burn window

source: Weather Underground

The conditions of the field were solid stand of fuel from last year's prairie grasses but also considerable greening underway. The key wind condition was waiting for the overall speed to diminish but it was tricky as ideal conditions would be short as the wind went from on the high side to the low side quickly. We pushed on both sides.

Another issue was neighbors to the East of one of the fields and the need to keep smoke from blowing over. We got some northernly wind but mostly westerly winds that limited the burn that evening.

Paul Mosely on the breaks

May 3rd prescribed burn

Two times the smoke plume unexpectedly turned black. There was no visible evidence as to why this occurred.

Weather conditions for May 6th burn window

The burn window on May 6th was short. However, provided a useful session as the burn field is flanked neighbors limiting what direction the wind can be coming from for a successful burn.

May 6th, 2026

Weather conditions for May 7th burn window

May 7th, 2026

May 10th 2026

Weather conditions for May 10th burn window

May 10th was the last burn window for the season. The burn windows require weather, conditions, and resource availability. The upper prairie is challenging due to difficult accessibility, size, topography, and other factors. The wind conditions were looking very good to reduce risk of the fire crossing a break. We had a team of three skilled burn team members that made allowed for the burn to proceed.

Some of the area to be burned were in the segment of the field that has a weak areas with brome and crown vetch crowding out prairie. It was getting to be a critical need to burn this area to set back the non-natives and energize native plants.