During the year between February 15th and April 30th, the State of Virginia Department of Forestry issues a burn law.  This law prohibits open air burning before 4pm daily if your fire is within 300 feet of woods or dry grass which can easily ignite due to the dry season.  If you burn after 4pm, you are only allowed to burn until 12am midnight and must stay with the fire at all times until it is extinguished.  To learn more about this, go to http://www.dof.virginia.gov/website/faqs-burning.shtml for more information.  When you conduct a controlled burn year round, we recommend that you contact the Emergency Communication Center in your county and advise them that you are conducting a control burn.  You will then be asked to call them back when the fire is out and they will clear it from the system.  The phone numbers for the ECC in Rockbridge County and Augusta County are listed below:

Augusta County Control Burn - (540) 245-5061

Rockbridge County Control Burn - (540) 261-6171

We also offer to come and stand by with a truck at your controlled burn for a donation to the Raphine Volunteer Fire Company.  If it makes you more comfortable, we will burn your brush, vacant lots, etc. as long as it is in a safe place away from buildings, woods, roadways and property lines.  If you feel this service would be helpful to you, you can contact the Raphine Volunteer Fire Company at (540) 377-2888 and we will place you on our controlled burn list.  Please let us know if we can be of any assistance.  Thank You.