FINALLY! We had a chance to burn on the Illinois farm this past weekend. Had planned on it a few weeks ago but just didn't have enough people and equipment to do it safely. Went back up with a full crew and the right equipment. Winds were pretty high on Saturday morning, so we focused on putting in additional firebreaks and did a little shed hunting as well. Winds decreased a bit in the afternoon and humidity was in the mid to upper 30's when we started, which was the low RH for the day.
It's really tough to burn on this farm because it's in the river bottoms and usually pretty wet this time of year. It's been unusually dry up there, and fuel loads were pretty heavy with all of the rank vegetation in these fields from years of growth. My goal was to get rid of the rank vegetation and reduce stem density so I can start spraying these fields to set back succession a good bit. The burn went great without a problem, and it was about 50 acres total across 4 different fields. And don't worry about those trees being hurt in those pics! Primarily silver maple, sweetgum, and cottonwood, so they need to go! I'm sure most of the saplings were only top killed, but at least it starts the process of getting rid of them.