Brush Pile Burn Training Class Held Here
South Central Texas Prescribed Burn Association (SCTPBA), in cooperation with Texas Parks and Wildlife and Fayette County AgriLife, sponsored a brush pile burn training class for landowners and land managers in the area, with the goal to reduce the number of brush pile calls to the volunteer fire departments. About 50 landowners from Fayette and surrounding counties attended.
SCTPBA is a neighbor helping neighbor organization that provides education, training, and planning prescribed burns for public safety, habitat restoration and improvements for wildlife and domestic livestock. Prescribed burning has been shown to be a very safe application of fire back into fire dependent habitats. This training was the eighth brush pile burning workshop presented across the state that has been led by local prescribed burn associations to transfer their knowledge of how to burn safely to other landowners. The instruction was provided by Greg Pleasant, Regional Fire Coordinator for TPWD, and Ray Hinnant, a director for the SCTPBA. Also in attendance were Fayette County Precinct 4 Commissioner Drew Brossman, who is also the Assistant Fire Chief for Schulenburg VFD, and Stephen Kelly, Fire Chief of Muldoon VFD and president of the Fayette County Firefighter’s Association. They stayed for the entire presentation and provided information about their experiences with brush piles getting out of control. Both were pleased to have so many people interested in learning how to burn safely attend the workshop.
Topics covered were liability, laws, regulations, weather, and fire behavior. Emphasis was placed on brush pile preparation, planning, and weather forecasts for the safest conditions to burn. Participants were presented with example burn plans for their use to safely burn their brush piles.
No matter how much experience and knowledge a person has there is always something to be learned about how to use fire safely. Prescribed burn associations across Texas are very interested in providing additional workshops.