The Big Burn!

 Five years ago I signed a Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) contract to put some of land into grass. The contract specified that mid-contract, i.e., in the fifth year of the ten year contract, some habitat renewal is necessary.  The choice is between burning before May 15, or light discing after Aug. 1.  One field of approximately 45 acres is ideal for burning.
 The major grasses in this CRP field are native to Eastern SD and are late summer, warm season grasses.  They are Big Blue Stem, Switchgrass, Side Oats Gamma and Indian Grass.  They are energized by spring fires as swept across the prairies.
  An invasive species is Brome Grass, which I think came from Russia.  It is extremely competitive and is an early spring grass that colonizes in the early season while the afore mentioned grasses are still dormant.  A spring burn knocks back the Brome Grass and sets up the warm weather grass for a good start.  After five years there was also a thick thatch that gives thistles a place to start.
  Eastern SD is still quite dry and so a burning is still in effect.  After surveying my field, the local fire chief  gave me permission to burn.  The field is ideally situated for a controlled burn.  It is boarded by a road on the west, pasture on the south and a plowed field on the east.  The only area of concern were the tree rows I had planted on the north.
   Monday I went to work on a firebreak between the grass and the trees.  Using my ancient disc to cultivate a twenty foot fire break it quickly became apparent that this would be more difficult than I'd anticipated.  The old disc works fine in plowing but on the sod it barely made an impression.  After an hour of going back and forth on the fire break the disc died. 
  A quick call and a twenty+ mile trip with the tractor I was back at work with a disc I'd borrowed from W.  It was only marginally better than my old one but persistence pays off.  By dinner I'd beaten a track into the sod that I thought would be adequate.
  A call to the Curmudgeonette got me the predicted wind speeds and directions for Tuesday.  The forecast promised light winds from the south east.  North would be better but light winds are helpful.
  At 7:00am D. and I began firing the grass from the northwest corner to widen the fire break protecting the trees.  With the dew on the track I disced we figured that there was little chance of the fire spreading north.  By the time we had fired the grass along the fire break the width of the field the wind switched.  Wind switches often raise havoc with controlled burns but in this case the wind switched to the north which was perfect for our purpose.  By 10:00 the entire field had been burned and there were only a  few pockets of fire left and by 11:00 the fire was entirely out.

  The pictures show before, from a couple of years ago, and during the burning.  The camera battery died so the after pictures will have to wait until I go back.