Is Your Landscape Fire-Wise? Follow These Tips to Make It So

Imagine you are peacefully sleeping in your home at night. All of a sudden, you wake up to the smell of something burning and see that you are surrounded by fire and smoke. Your entire house is in flames, and all your precious belongings slowly burning down to the ground. All the money and hard work spent to make that property a home along with all the commercial silk trees being reduced to ashes right before your eyes.

Now, you inquire about the cause of this entire accident. You find out that it all started when a tree in your lawn went up in flames from the fire left behind from a barbeque party hosted by your neighbors. You are left with a house in ashes, head filled with frustration and dismay, and nothing to be done. Not a pretty picture, is it?

Obliterating the root cause through firescaping

Well, if you do not wish to ever bear witness to such a scene, it would be a great idea to firescape your house and the surrounding landscape. Using artificial foliage can be of immense help in this aspect as they are often manufactured to be fire resistant. The process of firescaping involves the use and maintenance of the landscape surrounding the property to reduce the chances of fire. After all, you have to use all methods possible to prevent the destruction of your home through fire.

How can firescaping protect your house?

The process of firescaping simply reduces the chances of your home and the surrounding landscape catching fire. This is done through proper management of the landscape and the absence of a fire-conducive environment in the area. Just imagine, if you replace an actual tree bark with a fake tree bark in the lawn, the chances of that catching or spreading the fire reduces remarkably.

Proper plant selection for fire management

The choice of the plants to use in your lawn or the surrounding landscape can have tremendous effects in raising or lowering the chances of a fire. There are some trees, plants, and shrubs that are more vulnerable to fire than others. In such situations, it would be ideal to choose natural plants and trees based on their vulnerability towards catching fire. If a particular plant or tree is susceptible to catching fire, you can always choose to use an artificial tree, which has low chances of catching fire, in its place.

Proper positioning of the plants, trees, and shrubs

The positioning of the plants, trees, and shrubs also have a huge impact on the ability of a fire to spread. When one tree catches fire, it needs an adjacent tree or plants to also catch fire in order for the flames to spread. If, however, you manage to keep the big plants and large artificial trees adequately far apart from each other, you reduce the chances of the fire spreading. You can definitely fill the spaces in between with small flowering shrubs or hardscape materials. This will not only reduce the risks of large fires in your house but also enhance the beauty and overall appearance of your house.

Maintain a distance between any kind of greenery and the house

Fire safety standards have always claimed that a minimum distance of 30 feet must always be maintained between the house and any trees. Depending on the structural built of your house, you must always maintain this distance between any large trees in the landscape and the house. This will prevent the house from catching fire even if the surrounding landscape does. Some ways to do so include:

  • You can plant the large trees along the perimeter of your property while keeping the smaller plants in the interior sections.
  • Make use of artificial trees that are less susceptible to catching fire easily and quickly.
  • Plant small shrubs or flowering plants near the house in order to improve the appearance of the house. Their short heights will ensure that they do not catch fire from the surrounding tall trees.
  • Use hardscape products like wooden boards, tiles, stones, etc. to decorate the lawn area. These hardscape materials help to prevent any fire from spreading.
  • Plant artificial landscaping products like a fake tree stump or a bark to ensure that they can stop the fire from progressing any further.

Creating fire safety zones can break the progress of a fire

The area between the trees in the landscape and your house can be converted into fire safety zones to break the advance of a building fire. These fire safety zones will act as fuel breaks for the fire and prevent them from progressing any further. These fire safety zones usually include small water structures such as ponds, pools, streams, etc. You can certainly decorate the surrounding area of the water body with artificial plants, fake palm trees, and silk trees. These artificial plants do not offer much fodder to the fire and can stop it from spreading any further.

Proper cleaning of the landscape to remove dry plants and leaves

Dead plants, dry leaves and twigs, a dead bark and other such dry plants not only catch fire quickly, but they also help to spread it afar. Once a dry leaf or twig catches fire, a fast-paced wind can easily carry it to another piece of tree or plant. That plant would again catch fire and help it to progress ahead. Hence, it is important to keep your landscape clean and devoid of any dead plants, leaves, twigs, barks, etc.

Using artificial palm trees and other such faux landscaping products may also be a great idea to prevent the presence of such dry leaves and twigs in the first place. They will ensure that there is no dead plant material in the landscape while making no compromises on the beauty of the house and the surrounding area.

There are several other ways to firescape your residential property. At the same time, it is also important that you have appropriate protection and support in case a fire does happen. However, it is better to be safe than sorry, and hence, you should take all steps necessary to prevent a fire from forming or spreading across your house and the surrounding landscape.

This is a collaborative post

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