Editorial of March 21, 2024

Burn Bans, Brush and Bonfires

Last weekend, in between the splashes of even more torrential rain, Saturday was brilliant. A welcome touch of spring was in the air, daffodils were setting forth on their early growing trials, sun was warming the grasses, newly arrived migrating birds were greeting each other—and, it is hoped, us—and buds were popping out on the trees, all part of the traditional, lengthy, letting go of winter. Then it rained again, and now the temperature has dropped to below freezing. Again, but maybe for the last time.

Last Saturday also marked the beginning of the annual New York State burn ban, a two-month hiatus on residential brush burning, initiated and enforced by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. This year the ban is in effect from March 16 through May 14 when, if we are lucky, it will end. (It did not end then last year; the ban was extended until October due to extremely dry weather conditions.)

The burn ban in this state came about 14 years ago. It was begun to prevent wildland fires, to protect communities during what is perceived to be heightened springtime conditions for wildfires and to reduce air pollution. The record-breaking wildfires raging in Texas right now are a good case in point. Those fires could be here as well. This winter season, sadly but predictably, did not provide a great deal of snow cover across the state, which left dried, dormant vegetation from last summer exposed and susceptible to the daily, often hourly, weather fluctuations brought on by the warming temperatures of the beginning of spring. A perfect condition for a wildfire. In fact, there have already been fires around here, for the most part caused by the wind carrying burning debris into grassy and wooded areas that lack green, summer vegetation and moisture, the single-largest cause of such spring wildfires. In all, the burn ban has had a positive effect across New York. Since it was established, the average number of spring wildfires has decreased by more than 43 percent.

Residential brush fires in towns with fewer than 20,000 people are allowed during most of the year, but such open burning—the outdoor burning of vegetative yard waste, including brush (tree limbs less than six inches in diameter and eight feet in length, with attached leaves)—is restricted in the spring. Other, more controlled, types of fire, however, are not banned: back yard fire pits and campfires no more than three feet in height and four feet in width are allowed, as are small cooking fires and “celebratory” bonfires. All of these must, of course, be attended throughout their existence and then thoroughly extinguished; they must also not contain paper or household garbage.

This is not at all bad. Nor, in fact, is it particularly restrictive. This is what we should all be doing anyway, pretty much all the time. Then, maybe, we wouldn’t have those frightful forest fires, our fire-fighting volunteers could spend more time with their families and our wildlife would have a much better chance to happily thrive.