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Red flag warning, dry conditions and wind halts crop burning technique across capital region
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BATON ROUGE — Several parishes, including East Feliciana Parish, were under a burn ban Wednesday due to a red flag warning.
The National Weather Service issued the warning because of a combination of low humidity, the low amount of rain over the past couple of weeks, and higher wind speeds, which make conditions for fires to spread quickly if they started.
The red flag warning brought on problems for farmers across much of the state, as it halted the practice of burning sugarcane crops.
For much of the day, burning anything like debris, leaves, or crops was not allowed.
"Fires can easily and quickly get out of control. Yesterday we had nine fires across the state that our crews battled yesterday, and the majority of those were from debris fires that got out of control," Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry Commissioner Dr. Mike Strain said.
Sugarcane is harvested this time of year. Something that's done with sugarcane crops is that they're usually burned.
A memorandum on burning prevents that practice from happening.
"If you're a certified prescribed burner, you're an agricultural burner; you have to follow the protocol of prescribed burners. So when you have these weather conditions that are not conducive to doing agricultural burning, it's not allowed under those protocols," Dr. Stain said.
With it being fall, some people will tend to burn their leaves to get rid of the yard waste.
The Department of Agriculture and Forestry says this is something that should not be done under a red flag warning.
"That gust of wind can blow those leaves, and what happens is that most of those people burning leaves are burning them close to a residence or to a structure," Dr. Stain said.
During a burn ban, it's also recommended for cars not to park on dry grass or for people to use equipment that could spark.
Dr. Stain says agriculturalists are developing new technology that would potentially eliminate the need for burning sugarcane. It would be able to take the fiber from the debris of the crop and use it as a sort of compost back into the soil.
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