Charlie, It's been pretty hot here too, but things are looking up. The end of April I set fire to my ten year old 30 acre field of switch an other crap (my CRP contract had expired). I called the Polk volunteers first and they told me to go ahead and if they got a call they wouldn't respond unless it was from me. I had my Rhino with a barrel of water and a bucket and a broom and the field is bordered by 20' of green cool season grass. The wind was about 4 mph out of the ESE so I started on the west end with the Zippo and moved east a couple 100 yards and worked it again. When I was about 3/4 done, I thought I better check the perimeter; it was really cooking by then (little tornadic flames 40-50 feet in the air). Well, on the NW side it had jumped the cool season line and was headed through the dry leaves and dead wood into the hollow. I went to work the the broom and the bucket but it was gaining on me and in the steep hollow, being old an out of shape, I called 911 and asked the dispatcher to send their 1 ton 4WD with the 600 gallon tank and 150 foot hose. Well, Cap't Carl showed up first in his SUV with the Sheriff's star on it with 2 little extinguisers, one empty and the other half full. He got on the radio and called in the troops. Anyway it turned into a 3 alarm deal with Polk, New Pittsburg and Jeromesville responding. The result was that one of the units I asked for solved the problem, but the others had to do something so they proceeded to put out the parts I wanted to burn. Anyway, I got 90% of it done and the field looked like it had been napalmed, showing a lot of ant hills. Two and a half months later the switch grass is back, head high and thick; and a lot of crud (multiflora, briars) is gone, at least temporarily. Most of my friends don't like hunting the switch on my place (I guess they'd rather work their dogs on a golf course); but if they put a beeper on their pointer or put their shoulder to the cover and kept with their flusher, they'd get their game and the dogs don't mind at all.
Charlie, I also put out a couple of food plots in the field. I used the bucket on the tractor to push up a dike in a couple of drainages to make a water puddle in the center. When it rains, it works; when it's doesn't, it's dry. We'll se if that helps. The seed has been in the ground for a month and a half; the sunflowers are ready to bloom, the sorgum is starting to head out and the corn is knee high. I hope it attracts a few doves in a couple months.
Fred (Francis, how'm I doin')
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