Bonfire

We lost one of our better trees to emerald ash borer last year. With winter coming, Terry cut the tree down for firewood.

Trails of emerald ash borers under the bark of our green ash tree

The tree on the ground

This green ash was about 20” in diameter, so I was amazed to find that it was only 30 years old. Some of the rings were nearly half an inch, which is a lot for a tree to grow in a year. When I commented that the last ring was narrow despite a year of good precipitation, Terry pointed out that the tree was already infested and beginning to die at that point.



Tree rings

In the process of trimming up the trunk and larger branches produced a considerable amount of brush. Hooray! We can have a fire!

Stacks of branches

Last Sunday, Pat, Nancy, and Jane came up for the burn. It wasn’t long before we had a huge fire going. Terry was right (not surprisingly) that ash dries quickly. Even though the tree died just this year, there was little evidence of moisture in the branched. Many trees have to age a year before they can be burned.

The start of the fire

The small branches burned fast and hot. We had to take frequent breaks to let the wood burn down until we could get close enough to feed it again, but it only took a few minutes for the branches to incinerate.



Terry by the fire

Pat feeds the fire

Hilda tosses a log

 

We were out by the fire from about 2:00 to 5:30. The last hour or so we were in the dark. I was fascinated watching the flames run along the branches. As the air currents passed by, the branches would flame or not. Here is a video of several stages of the fire after dark. At first, it was still raging. The next part shows the flames running on the branches, and finally, the dying embers just before we went in for supper.