64 Forest Fires in TN lots of smoke in the Garden.

[Gary350]

I bet all this smoke would be good to keep away bugs if I had any bugs in the garden. Super moon does not look very super with all the haze in the air. Everything from KY border to AL border to Atlanta ocean is on fire 64 forest fires in TN along. No frost yet and no rain since Aug 15. Smoky Mountain National Park is closed for fire and smoke so are other TN State parks. I am still getting tomatoes from the garden, also Kale, peas, several types of peppers, and herbs. Broccoli is getting larger, onions and garlic I planted 2 months ago look good. I have 1 potato plant that does not seem to grow. I harvested a large basket about 60 bell peppers last night form all my plants still no frost. Weather man keeps saying frost but no frost yet. It is warming up and going to be 77 degrees Thursday and a hard freeze 29 degrees Sunday night, I will believe it when is happens. LOL. The garden may be mostly finished Monday if it really does get 29. I know Kale and Broccoli will be ok at 29 I think broccoli is good down to 25 and kale is good to about 15 degrees. My Swiss chard and lettuce all came up it is 1" tall and been like that for over a month. The only thing that has not grown yet are the carrots seeds and celery seeds they should come up in spring when the weather is right. I am not sure how much cold my Alaska snow peas can take.

[!potatoes!]

lots of smoke in western nc as well. very dry, and no rain expected for quite a while. we've had some freezing though - 5 or 6 times already. just hoping for rain.

[Gary350]

Grand son accidentally started a fire last weekend with an ax. He was chopping small trees and brush with the ax behind the back yard barb wire and chain link fence he hit something that make sparks and quick as magic there was a fire. It scared him at first I told him to step on it with your shoes but that was not stopping it. Being in the brush with several small trees it could not be put out by stepping on it so it spread quick. I ran for the 100 ft garden hose and yelled for him and grandmother to run get the other 2 hoses and someone turn the water on fast. The first hose arrived before I had the spray nozzle remove got it screwed on then got the other one on then the spray and yell for water. It took 30 seconds for water to get there it seemed like 5 minutes. A breezy started to blow and the flames took off across the field so I strayed water way out front where there was no fire by the time the fire got there it was too wet to burn. Then I started to spray the sides little by little the fire got smaller but it kept flaming up again where it had already gone out. I realized #1 most important thing to do is keep the fire from getting beyond the reach of my water hose so I sprayed out front as much as I could and still tried to keep the sides under control but the fire kept burning wider to the east and west. It was a race for 10 minutes the fire just kept getting away but pretty soon there was no more fires out front and I had the sides under control. After about 15 minutes it was out but it kept flaming up again along the sides so I kept spraying the side and smoke was still pouring up from every where it was hard to see where to spray water. Next thing I see another fire out front to the south I finally had the hot spots out the smoke was still bad. I rested and grandmother sprayed for 30 more minutes until all the smoke was gone, then we all kept an eye on it for another 2 hours. WOW that was a very close call. If we had been 10 seconds slower with the hoses it would have gotten out of control. The most amazing thing I ever saw is how easy a few sparks can start a fire. TV News report said, some kids were throwing rock next thing they knew there was a fire, I don't think anyone believed the fire was really started from throwing rock.

Wind changed direction tonight super moon is 17,525. miles closer to earth.

[rainbowgardener]

Yup. I am in the Chattanooga area and it is very bad here.

I made a post about it in the weather thread here: https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/vi ... 22#p398922

with a picture of the smoke.

That picture is from the newspaper. Here's a couple pictures I took myself of the TN river with the smoky sky.

Compare this to a picture I took of the same river in Nov last year

[ButterflyLady29]

Yes, you can start fires with rocks. I've nearly done it myself on accident but haven't yet tried to do it on purpose. Flint and steel are commonly used to start fires. There's another way using pyrite and flint but I haven't tried that either. That's how primitive peoples started fires before Bic and Zippo came about.

[imafan26]

Wow, that is awesome and scary. The air must be very dry there as well as the vegetation. Most fires here are started by kids playing with matches or careless drivers tossing out a cigarette. The last big fire was in Wahiawa and eventually the rain put it out.