Prescribed Burn Association Organizes in the Concho Valley

San Angelo, TX – A group of 30 ranchers and family members recently converged on the Mayfield Ranch in southwest Tom Green County. They brought pick up trucks, cattle sprayers, 4-wheelers, lots of water and lunch. They looked like they could have showed up to work cattle. But this was a different occasion – they brought drip torches and shovels to provide some hands-on help with range management on the ranch owned by Stanley Mayfield of Christoval.

This group actually represented a grass roots partnership recently formed to conduct prescribed burns. Organized as the Concho Valley Chapter, they are a sub-chapter of the Edwards Plateau Prescribed Burning Association, Inc. (EPPBA), based in Sonora, Texas. Current membership of the EPPBA includes eight chapters with close to 400 ranchers managing over one million acres. Growing quickly, the Concho Valley Chapter has members in Tom Green and Irion counties and is seeking membership from other landowners in the Concho Valley.

Trained personnel from the USDA-Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and Texas Agriculture Experiment Station (TAES) briefed the group on the burn plan and dispensed equipment. Everyone was handed a map and a radio and given their assignment.

With proper authorities previously notified, bladed fire guards in place, and water sprayers filled and ready, they lit the initial fires to create a black line as a safety margin against the fire guard. Once the black lines were in place, the interior portions of the area were successfully burned.

The weather conditions were excellent for a prescribed burn and the desired results were achieved in the pasture. The event provided valuable training experience for the Concho Valley Chapter and will help control the prickly pear and regrowth of red berry juniper in Mayfield’s pasture.

The prescribed burn they conducted at Mayfield’s Ranch was a historic occasion as it represented their first official action as an organized chapter. The EPPBA requires each chapter to elect officers, pay dues (used to buy equipment), hold liability insurance and have an inventory of equipment available. Chapter members must attend fire training school, participate in prescribed burns and develop fire plans with qualified representatives from the NRCS and TAES.

The concept of a prescribed burning association (PBA) was established by the formation of the Edwards Plateau Prescribed Burning Association, Inc. in 1997 to help with the restoration of rangeland in the Edwards Plateau. With their neighbor-helping-neighbor approach, members of a PBA share equipment and labor and foster good relations between each other and the community.

The association also helps restore a “fire culture” to Texas. Early settlers found Indians using fire and adapted the practice to better manage their land. Another goal of the PBA is to help educate the public about prescribed burning. Prescribed burning is a land management tool used to restore and maintain native plant communities to their former diversity and productivity for livestock production and wildlife habitat. A prescribed burning regime in a regional scale can mitigate catastrophic wildfire by suppressing and managing fuel loads produced by noxious woody plants and brushy overgrowth. The organization is run by ranchers and landowners for ranchers and landowners.

George Clendenin, NRCS Rangeland Management Specialist, in San Angelo helped the local landowners organize and form the Concho Valley Chapter and developed the Chapter’s first Burn Plan, which establishes the objectives of the burn and details the type of fire needed to meet those objectives. Both the formation of the chapter and its first burn have been successful with help from Butch Taylor, director and superintendent of TAES in Sonora, and Charles Anderson, NRCS zone rangeland management specialist.

The TAES and the NRCS will continue to act as technical advisors for this chapter and others.

“This is an excellent example of interagency cooperation,” Clendenin stated. “I see the vision of this chapter, as well as others, to be a self sustaining entity run by ranchers and landowners.

“We are here to help educate and train the landowners to plan and conduct their own burning,” Clendenin continued. “These chapters will only be successful when ranchers like Stanley Mayfield step up and take leadership and actually have the desire to learn the art and science behind prescribed burning.”

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