Vesper No. 6 | Magic | Spring-Summer 2022
Kevin Benham
Power
On a warm, sunny afternoon in the Flint Hills of Kansas on August 29, 2019, a group of firefighters joined with the National Park Service and the United States Department of the Interior at the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve to ignite a fire along a mile-long stretch of Highway 177 in Strong City, Kansas. The measure of the mile had been carefully chosen in advance for a land art piece titled Mile Long Burn with the intent of creating a large-scale temporal land art intervention, reinvigorating the growth of prairie plants, and keeping invasive species at bay.
The power of the fire that day was magical.
This powerful transformation of the vegetation from a crisp brown wave into an
elemental source of carbon is a critical component of the ecology of
grasslands. The power of fire is intrinsically tied to the origin of plants in
that plants are responsible for two of the three elements essential to the
existence of fire: oxygen and fuel.
The power and magic of the Mile Long Burn that warm day in August 2019 will continue to nourish the prairie for years to come and will contribute to the biodiversity of the dwindling tallgrass prairies.
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