Having a big garden means that as well as producing fruit, veg and flowers, we also produce a lot of rubbish. By this I mean weeds, prunings, hedge trimmings and the like, most of which we compost, but some we have to burn. On average we have a bonfire twice a year.

So that’s what we did last Monday. Our neighbours were away for the week so it seemed an ideal time, (words have been exchanged in the past when our smoke blew on their washing) but that’s another story.

The forecast for the week was dry, but getting very windy, so Monday seemed a good choice. It was sunny, bright, breezy and warm, and there was a huge amount waiting to be burnt. It was lined up like a long train behind the old apple trees.

We started just before 2pm. It was hard, hot work and we soon regretted having started, but as the saying goes ‘we’ve started so we’ll finish’. The breeze was a nuisance and kept blowing the flames which set the compost heap on fire, but having been there before, we had buckets of water on hand to put it out.

At about 5.15pm I put the last load of twigs on to the fire. What a relief, I was tired, hot and sweaty and had no hairs left on my forearms. All I wanted was my tea, a shower and a sit down.

Our normal routine at this point is that I go in to make the tea (something quick and microwaveable) whilst Peter stays outside to marshal the fire, raking the embers/ash into a neat and safe pile. Then he comes in for his tea and when he’s eaten he goes back outside to make sure all is well. Usually it is, on Monday it wasn’t.

We’d had our tea, watched the news and I was heading for the shower as Peter went out for his final inspection. I was just putting my toe in the water when I heard the door open and a voice shout, “We’ve got a problem”, and disappear again. I quickly threw on just enough clothing to keep me decent and followed him outside.

Indeed we did have a problem. Whilst we’d been indoors the breeze had turned into a strong, swirling wind which was blowing the glowing embers from the fire, making them look like fire-flies in the fading light. The problem was these fire-flies packed a punch and had started several secondary fires in the surrounding area.

This probably sounds worse than it actually was. The fact is we had gone out in the nick of time and caught them before they had taken hold. I shudder to think what would have happened had we not gone out when we did.

For the next 45 minutes we poured buckets of water on both the fire itself and it’s offspring, we reckon in excess of 20 gallons, until we felt it was safe to leave. The fading light was a blessing in a way because the glowing embers were very easy to spot and extinguish, but to be honest we could both have done without these crepuscular shenanigans.

The following morning all was well, though the fire still had some heat at it’s core. I think we were very lucky not to have had a disaster on our hands.