Should brush burning be banned?

For some property owners, brush-burning is a springtime ritual. But this routine has been hard on our collective pocket books.

So far this year, 18 out of 19 fires that have had to be put out by provincial fire-fighting crews across Northwestern Ontario were caused by human carelessness, most often due to the intentional burning of yard waste.

Unfortunately, this is part of a recurring trend. In 2016, 466 of the 636 fires extinguished by Ontario firefighters across the province were attributed to human careless, including unattended camp fires and, yes, brush-burning.

Last year, the province burned through more than $42 million putting out forest fires. Some of those fires were caused by lightning, but the majority were preventable.

Some people who like burning brush in April and May would be annoyed by a province-wide ban on said activity. Some of those people are likely very careful: they follow safety guidelines and don’t leave fires unattended.

But obviously, judging by the dismal track record across the province, too many do indeed leave fires unattended, burn on windy days or do not ensure they have a garden hose ready to go.

We’ve seen this movie before. Buddy lights up a metal trash barrel filled with brush, then heads inside to catch a bit of the NHL playoffs. The barrel gets hot as a blast furnace and ignites the dry, crispy grass it’s resting on. Buddy comes back out to find his whole yard in flames, well beyond the fire-fighting capability of a standard garden hose.

This type of scenario once caused the evacuation of Beardmore and led to one of the largest human-caused fires ever experienced in the Municipality of Greenstone. It raged for weeks, torching many rural camps.

The province notes that, when property owners are convicted of carelessness, they can be ordered to pay the cost of putting out a fire, which can be very substantial if waterbombers are required. Those who can’t afford to pay that cost, as well as hefty fines, might face a few days in jail.

Surely a burn ban is a more practical way to deal with an activity that seems, in our time anyway, more recreational than necessary. Many people who feel compelled to burn brush do not live on farms.

A brush-burning ban would also encourage property owners to look at alternative ways of dealing with woody waste, including chipping and composting.

In a time of global warming, we would do well to find ways to burn as little as possible. There are enough forest fires in our neck of the woods that are linked to natural causes. -- Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal