I was on my way home tonight and noticed some strange lights hovering above Sturgis. It wasn’t Mister Spock – it turns out the U.S. Forest Service did some prescribed burns this afternoon, and a few of them ran a little late. The result was a nice orange glow on the hills in Boulder Canyon.

Forest officials intentionally burn off the thick undergrowth in certain places, especially in the winter, to keep the possibilities of summer wildfires low.

I took a couple of shots of one blaze with my pea-shooter camera. The results weren’t spectacular, but at least you can tell what’s going on.

This one is a little tough to make out, but you can see the light orange glow of the fire at the top of the picture. Below, the taillights of a car streak along Highway 14A, which runs along the bottom of Boulder Canyon.

Not as good as the first, but you can tell that the flames are only burning the underbrush. The large, mature trees aren’t affected.