{"id":125671,"date":"2026-04-21T16:20:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-21T22:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/prescribed-burns-near-dolores-bring-hazy-skies\/"},"modified":"2026-04-21T16:20:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T22:20:12","slug":"prescribed-burns-near-dolores-bring-hazy-skies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/prescribed-burns-near-dolores-bring-hazy-skies\/","title":{"rendered":"Prescribed burns near Dolores bring hazy skies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Prescribed
Prescribed broadcast fires ignited on Sunday clear vegetation in Boggy Draw, northwest of Durango. (Courtesy of National Forest Service)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Residents in Southwest Colorado woke Monday to hazy skies and the scent of smoke. The cause? Prescribed burns on National Forest land north of Cortez.<\/p>\n

U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Lorenna Williams said firefighters began broadcast burns on 1,242 acres in Boggy Draw, with another 344 acres planned for Monday. The burns were ignited by hand and from a helicopter and monitored closely for safety, Williams said.<\/p>\n

A steady southwest wind carried smoke aloft, creating hazy skies, Williams said.<\/p>\n

\"Firefighters
Firefighters ignited prescribed burns via helicopter on Sunday in Boggy Draw, northwest of Durango. Using helicopters allows firefighters to more effectively ignite controlled burns over large areas of forest when fire danger is low. (Courtesy of National Forest Service)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cWe work with the state for smoke permits and make sure that the smoke impacts \u2013 while they are real and they do impact communities \u2013 stay below the legal threshold that the state has set for smoke dispersal,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n

Fire conditions, including wind, aligned perfectly Sunday to safely conduct the burns, Williams said.<\/p>\n

Firefighters ignited the burns without concern they would grow out of control.<\/p>\n

\u201cOxygen is a critical component to wildfires and prescribed fires, because fire needs oxygen,\u201d Williams said. \u201cWhat we want is a low, steady wind that\u2019s going to carry that smoke up and away and disperse it very broadly.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"An
An aerial view of prescribed burns being conducted on the National Forest in Boggy Draw, north of Dolores and Cortez. (Courtesy of National Forest Service)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Once the burns in Boggy Draw are wrapped up, firefighters may return to Sauls Creek outside of Bayfield to conduct additional prescribed burns, Williams said. That work is weather-dependent, she said, but with another wet spring storm forecast for the weekend, conditions look favorable.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love to time prescribed fires in those nice, clear days with a steady breeze, right before a little bit of rain comes in,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n

Burning in Sauls Creek could also create smoke impacts, though those will be more concentrated to Bayfield, Ignacio and the U.S. Highway 160 corridor east of Durango, Williams said.<\/p>\n

To stay up to date on prescribed burns, visit inciweb.com<\/a> or the Columbine Ranger District\u2019s Facebook<\/a> page.<\/p>\n

sedmondson@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\"A
A map of the Boggy Draw controlled burns. (Courtesy of National Forest Service)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fuels-reduction project being done while fire danger is low, Forest Service says<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":125672,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5736,5735],"tags":[350,199,549],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-125671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","category-news","tag-fire","tag-san-juan-national-forest","tag-united-states-forest-service"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125671"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=125671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}