Burning Weeds In Your Lawn - What You Need To Know

When your bin is full of yard debris and weeds are piling up in the garden, one of the best options is to burn them. This is called open burning.

There are a set of rules you have to adhere to when you want to burn weeds in the lawn. This is because the burning process may release dangerous chemicals and a huge amount of smoke into the air. The fire may also get out of hand and cause damage to property and people or even death.

Rules For Burning

Burning can be dangerous and quickly get out of hand.

Whether you have a weed problem in your front yard, backyard, steep slope, around your trees, or somewhere else, it's best to have a restriction on the size of the pile of the weeds that you plan to burn. Most areas have rules stating that you mustn't burn a pile larger than 4 feet by 4 feet. You are also required to get a permit before conducting any burning even if it's on your lawn.

In the city, there is a set day of the week for conducting burning. This is to alert the fire department to be on standby in case of emergency.

Burning materials that have been painted is normally prohibited because paints have oil as their ingredients. Oil usually escalates fire and can easily cause the fire to explode or make it large and difficult to control.

Burning of wood that has been treated such as plywood and particle board is also normally prohibited. The treated woods releases the chemicals that were initially used for their treatment process into the atmosphere.

Methods and Devices

It's recommended that you use a blowtorch to burn weeds on your lawn.

Stalk Burning

Stalk burning is the most common and easiest way to burn weeds.

You cut down the weeds, rake them together into a single pile, expose them to air, and wait for the sun to dry them up. This is because dry materials burn faster and produce less smoke.

When it's all dry, you heap the weed into one stack and burn.

Backing Fire

You start the fire along an anchor point of your lawn such as a barrier or road. The fire then progresses slowly to other areas of the lawn.

Strip-Heading Fire

This is a series of lines of fire set progressively upwind so that no individual line rises to a high energy level before it reaches either another line of fire or a fire break. Get more details about it here.

Other methods include flanking fires and point source fires. See the video below for an illustration:

Safety Precautions

1. Careless burning may cause accidents, leading to physical burns and the accumulation of smoke particles in the lungs that may cause breathing complications and other health hazards. This mostly affects the elderly and young children. It's advisable to keep such people away from burning weeds.

2. Use regular safety precautions when working around a fire such as wearing the proper clothing and gloves.

3. Exercise caution when close to the fire. It's best to clear the area around the fire from large stones and other movement barriers as they may cause you to trip and fall into the fire.

I hope this answers your questions about burning weeds in the lawn. Good luck!