Search...
Home Subscribe
Pie
Home Subscribe
Recent topics Flagged topics Hot topics Best topics
Search...
Search within large farm Search permies
Advance search Google search
Register / Login
organic pools package deal: video, manual, and World Domination Gardening WGD garden permaculture bootcamp design with leaf Building a Better World Book with people picking apples thread boost
  • Post Reply Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic
permaculture forums growies critters building homesteading energy monies kitchen purity ungarbage community wilderness fiber arts art permaculture artisans regional education skip experiences global resources cider press projects digital market permies.com pie forums private forums all forums
permaculture chickens permaculture bootcamp woman working on barrel Full online Permaculture Design course and Appropriate Technology Course video Paul Wheaton Tour of Wheaton Labs movie WDG garden
this forum made possible by our volunteer staff, including ...
master stewards:
  • r ranson
  • Nancy Reading
  • Carla Burke
  • John F Dean
  • Jay Angler
  • paul wheaton
stewards:
  • Nicole Alderman
  • Pearl Sutton
  • Anne Miller
master gardeners:
  • Christopher Weeks
  • Timothy Norton
gardeners:
  • Nina Surya
  • Matt McSpadden
  • thomas rubino

Burning straw in the field - Is this a normal practice in North America?

 
Mike Haasl
steward
Posts: 15697
Location: Northern WI (zone 4)
4923
7
I like...
hunting trees books food preservation solar woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
I know a couple of guys who are writing a book.  They are submitting that straw from annual grain crops is often burned in the field.  This came as a surprise to me.  Can anyone confirm if burning straw in the field is a common practice in North America?  And if they're burning the stubble or all the straw?

Thanks everyone!

SKIP books, get 'em while they're hot!!! Skills to Inherit Property
See me in a movie building a massive wood staircase:Low Tech Lab Movie

 
thomas rubino
rocket scientist
Posts: 6533
Location: latitude 47 N.W. montana zone 6A
3401
I like...
cat pig rocket stoves
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Hey Mike;  I know that over in N Idaho they burn grass and wheat fields. It has become controversial in the last 20 years over the air quality in the Coeur D alene &  Spokane  area's.
Many farmers have sold their land and moved down to the Coeur D Alene Indian reservation or into eastern Washington where they still allow field burning. It is burned as stubble.

For all your Montana Masonry Heater parts (also known as) Rocket Mass heater parts.
Visit me at
dragontechrmh.com Once you go brick you will never go back!

 
Mike Haasl
steward
Posts: 15697
Location: Northern WI (zone 4)
4923
7
I like...
hunting trees books food preservation solar woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Thanks Thomas!  So that is one confirmation that wheat/grain fields are still burned BUT that it is stubble being burnt, not the whole piece of straw.  

Any other folks with experiences to add?

SKIP books, get 'em while they're hot!!! Skills to Inherit Property
See me in a movie building a massive wood staircase:Low Tech Lab Movie

 
Marco Banks
gardener
Posts: 1774
Location: Los Angeles, CA
564
I like...
hugelkultur forest garden books urban chicken food preservation
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 2
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
No, it's not a common practice.  There were a few regions where people used to do it commonly (the Palouse of Eastern Washington and Idaho being one, as mentioned above) but improvements in no-till drills and other machinery have made this unnecessary.

When you think of straw, it's a byproduct from grain crops like wheat, oats, and barley.  Of those three, wheat (by far) is grown on a large scale.  Burning the massive wheat fields that range from Northern Texas all the way up to North Dakota (and even further, up into Manitoba, Saskachawan and Alberta) would be a massive environmental nightmare.  It's simply not done.  Perhaps on an isolate basis, where a farmer has a problem with cheat grass or some other invasive, but having grown up in this part of the world, people don't burn their fields.

"The rule of no realm is mine.  But all worthy things that are in peril as the world now stands, these are my care.  And for my part, I shall not wholly fail in my task if anything that passes through this night can still grow fairer or bear fruit and flower again in days to come.  For I too am a steward.  Did you not know?"    Gandolf

 
Mike Haasl
steward
Posts: 15697
Location: Northern WI (zone 4)
4923
7
I like...
hunting trees books food preservation solar woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Thanks Marco!  That's what my intuition was telling me.  If all of the dakotas burned each fall, I wouldn't be able to see the sky here in WI.

SKIP books, get 'em while they're hot!!! Skills to Inherit Property
See me in a movie building a massive wood staircase:Low Tech Lab Movie

 
Joseph Lofthouse
author & steward
Posts: 7289
Location: Cache Valley, zone 4b, Irrigated, 9" rain in badlands.
3498
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator

In northern Utah it is rare for a grain field to be burned intentionally. Once in a while, a malfunctioning piece of equipment catches a field on fire, but it's not typically done on purpose.

Landrace Gardening, author
Open Source Plant Breeding Forum, founder
Adaptation Agriculture: Video Course, Community, and Seed Share

 
Timothy Markus
pollinator
Posts: 981
Location: New Brunswick, Canada
244
I like...
duck tiny house chicken composting toilet homestead
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
This is the first time I've heard of burning off the straw stubble.

I know that it used to be common practice in the mid West to do 'controlled' burns on old, dry pasture in order to get rid of the stand and get new growth going, but that's fallen out of favour.  It's still a common practice in parts of Africa where the short growing season lends itself to grass that gets over 5-6 ft tall.  That grass is very low in quality, so it's burned to stimulate new growth.

A piece of land is worth as much as the person farming it.
-Le Livre du Colon, 1902

 
Tereza Okava
gardener
Posts: 4174
Location: South of Capricorn
2219
I like...
dog rabbit urban cooking writing homestead ungarbage
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Just saw you specified North America only! Sorry!

Down here in southern Brazil there are good amounts of wheat fields, they are all harvested by a monster machine that separates the rice/straw/chaff and blows it all back on the fields.
grassland pasture is sometimes burned (as mentioned by Timothy above), but never cultivated fields.

But when I lived in Japan (rural North, until the late 90s), I distinctly recall farmers burning the rice straw in their fields in piles. Not the stubble or the chaff, which was kept on the rice til it was polished, but the straw. Some small amounts were used for traditional crafts, but for the most part it was burned. I used to do a lot of distance cycling through the countryside and I can still remember the smell distinctly.
 
Mike Haasl
steward
Posts: 15697
Location: Northern WI (zone 4)
4923
7
I like...
hunting trees books food preservation solar woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Thanks Tereza!  Sorry, the book they're writing is likely for a North American audience so that's why I limited it.  I did see more mention of burning straw on Google with respect to rice farming.

When I refer to "stubble", I'm talking about the short piece of straw that is still attached to the roots after the harvester has come through.

SKIP books, get 'em while they're hot!!! Skills to Inherit Property
See me in a movie building a massive wood staircase:Low Tech Lab Movie

 
Bryant RedHawk
gardener
Posts: 6814
Location: Arkansas - Zone 7B/8A stoney, sandy loam soil pH 6.5
1657
I like...
hugelkultur dog forest garden duck fish fungi hunting books chicken writing homestead
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
In the South there are still field burn offs, mostly it is the rice fields these days but it used to be wheat stubble too, now they use a fly over method for planting most of the wheat in the fall so they do very little tilling or burning of those fields.

Burning field stubble does do some good, just not as much good as simply planting through it and letting it rot in place.
Prairie is fire dependent as an example of why one would want to burn any field. The ash deposit rebuilds the soil, dormant seeds in the soil are activated to sprout and grow, that's how the prairie is replenished.

Most of the farmers here in the south harvest the crop (wheat, oats, rice) then some will harvest the straw about a week after all the seed heads have been harvested. Then, if they are going to burn, they light the fires.
Today most are growing the wheat crop and planting soybeans behind the wheat harvest.
The rice harvest is later in the fall so that land usually will get burned and laid to fallow over the winter, unless they plan to rent duck hunting space which means they are going to flood the paddies a second time.

List of Bryant RedHawk's Epic Soil Series Threads We love visitors, that's why we live in a secluded cabin deep in the woods. "Buzzard's Roost (Asnikiye Heca) Farm." Promoting permaculture to save our planet.

 
Mike Haasl
steward
Posts: 15697
Location: Northern WI (zone 4)
4923
7
I like...
hunting trees books food preservation solar woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Thanks Dr!  Could you hazard a guess as to what percentage of the straw (not stubble) is burnt in the fields vs harvested and used?

SKIP books, get 'em while they're hot!!! Skills to Inherit Property
See me in a movie building a massive wood staircase:Low Tech Lab Movie

 
Skandi Rogers
pollinator
Posts: 2339
Location: Denmark 57N
598
I like...
fungi foraging trees cooking food preservation
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
It was common practice in England but has been banned for many years now. It was only the stubble that was burnt after harvest and after the straw was baled.
 
Leora Laforge
pollinator
Posts: 173
Location: Saskatchewan
55
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
It is common practice to burn flax straw where I am. Flax straw takes far longer to break down than any other type of straw. It is not common practice to burn any other type of straw. Most of this burning is done in the winter when there is no risk of it spreading or in the spring before seeding begins.

 
Ken W Wilson
pollinator
Posts: 1190
Location: Nevada, Mo 64772
123
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Burning wheat stubble off isn’t too uncommon here. It’s not an every year thing though.

Prairies are burned off every few years to control brush and weeds. Not sure how often, maybe about every four years.
 
Travis Johnson
pollinator
Posts: 4958
1198
I like...
transportation duck trees rabbit tiny house chicken earthworks building woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Here in Maine it is very common to burn blueberry fields. It has been done for centuries as it was done by the Indians, and mainer's took over the practice. It is done every other year though.

Lately there is a massive USDA program being done to move the rocks so that mowing can be done instead, under the idea that it would prevent forest fires and air pollution, but a lot of blueberry farmers feel burning is better than mowing. I am not a blue berry grower, so I am not sure if they are right, and that for blue berries burning is better, or they are just slow to accept change?

 
Rebecca Norman
gardener
Posts: 2535
Location: Ladakh, Indian Himalayas at 10,500 feet, zone 5
867
I like...
trees food preservation solar greening the desert
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Burning crop waste is a big problem in much of North india (though not as far north as I am). It contributes to the news you've been seeing every year in November, where Indian cities keep breaking air pollution records and adding digits to the monitoring equipment.

Works at a residential alternative high school in the Himalayas SECMOL.org . "Back home" is Cape Cod, E Coast USA.

 
Jondo Almondo
Posts: 203
Location: NNSW Australia
28
posted 6 years ago
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
I know it's not USA, but in parts of Australia, sugar-cane is burnt for a whole season every single year. It's meant to increase yield by a minuscule amount. Apparently our district is the worst for it - some folks actually like it as a tradition, turn up with a beer to watch the blaze.

My veggie garden gets blanketed with charred stalks and my heart condition acts up when they do a big burn 8km's away.
I don't get how it's legal, nor how the farmers don't understand that the black stuff flying on the wind is their soil carbon.

Examine your lifestyle, multiply it by 7.7 billion other ego-monkeys with similar desires and query whether that global impact is conscionable.

 
Tom Worley
pollinator
Posts: 96
Location: Ozark Border
39
I like...
fish hunting urban
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Here in the midwest folks burn hay pasture fairly regularly, but I can't recall seeing grain fields/straw burned, either in conventional ag systems or in the numerous Mennonite communities I've worked around and traveled through.  Typically the straw his harvested and used as animal bedding or for other projects.
 
Mike Haasl
steward
Posts: 15697
Location: Northern WI (zone 4)
4923
7
I like...
hunting trees books food preservation solar woodworking
posted 6 years ago
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
    Send
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
Thanks everyone for all the feedback!  I think it answered the question and hopefully will guide these fine authors in their quest.  Cheerio!

SKIP books, get 'em while they're hot!!! Skills to Inherit Property
See me in a movie building a massive wood staircase:Low Tech Lab Movie

 
I've read about this kind of thing at the checkout counter. That's where I met this tiny ad:
A PDC for cold climate homesteaders
http://permaculture-design-course.com
reply
reply
    Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic
Boost this thread!
Similar Threads
More...