polite request re: garden bonfires

[fl0wer]

Can folk use the wheelie bins and compost makers and dry hedge techniques to get their gardens shipshape, this year, pretty please?

Having checked the 'rules', I see that we CAN have a one-hour bonfire, and it MUST be around dusk,

however,

with the warm weather at last, so many of us would like evening time outdoors, and keeping the windows open too.

No bonfire = civilised clean-air gesture for the whole neighbourhood.

[the-e-dealer]

So is this a Campaign for Tidy Gardens? or for us to have a bonfire around dusk?

[*Bob*]

I suspect, a campaign specifically hoping that the person having a bonfire - as we speak - reads this post.

[fl0wer]

Neither, e-dealer and *Bob*, glad to say.

It is as the letter says, just a polite request.

[wee quinnie]

What is "dry hedge technique"?

[ladyinred]

I'm confused..............when I phoned Southwark Council about 2 weeks ago because a neighbour has a bonfire going at 11.30a.m.

I was told that bonfires were NOT allowed at any time.

:-(

[uncleglen]

There is no need for them. Builders should dispose of their waste responsibly, and householders can recycle- the brown bins will take branches up to 4" in diameter.

[fl0wer]

My research went as far as this forum in 2012, so if you were in touch with the council more recently, ladyinred, then it's either a newer development or I was misinformed in the 1st place.

wee queenie, making dry hedges

is only going to suit gardeners who have the space. You make an undisturbed "hedge" of dry brushwood and prunings, it will soon be a nest site for garden birds, safe from predators for a few years.

Gradually the hedge breaks up & is absorbed into topsoil. This is much less harmful than fires.

[Rianoo]

I agree with flower - our house this evening smells of "something" burned - due to a close neighbour having a bonfire.

[UncleBen]

You can't burn stuff. Call the council.

[the-e-dealer]

So Barbecues banned ho flipping ra

[UncleBen]

I'd ban bbqs-this is England,not Oz, plus don't want my house stinking of your bbq, or my washing that I hang out 'cos you watch crap tv. Southwark is a smoke free zone re burning refuse so is illegal.

[oimissus]

I do find it annoying that people think that the middle of a blazing hot day, when others have their windows open, washing out, are generally in their gardens - is the ideal time for a bonfire. My dad wouldn't have a bonfire except in the autumn on a fairly manky but-not-actually-raining evening. He would not budge on this, and damn right too. Bonfire smoke is really pervasive, too - BBQs are pongier but bonfire smoke seems to travel further.

I don't object to BBQs so much as obviously they are a fair weather activity, but I do mind when they are very close to the house - have them at the end of the garden! And tell your neighbours so they can close their windows and bring in the washing!!

[ladywotlunches]

Someone on Forest Hill Road had a bonfire last night, and pretty big it was too. So big in fact we thought there was a house on fire and hubby went down to check (not me, obvs!)

[the-e-dealer]

Yes obviously !

[ladywotlunches]

Fl0wer, thanks for the tip on dry hedging. Now I have a name for that heap of garden rubbish at that sits next to the composter because its too woody to mulch down properly!

[the-e-dealer]

Maybe the rule should be changed so bonfires are at dawn rather than at dusk.

[BigED]

I think you're allowed to have a fire in an incinerator. Don't know if there are time constraints on that. Also, if you're near allotments, they are allowed to have small bonfires. Don't know how you're meant to define "small" though.

[BigED]

Couldn't find anything on Southwark site but this on gov.uk:

"There are no laws against having a bonfire, but there are laws for the nuisance they can cause."

https://www.gov.uk/garden-bonfires-rules

[Beej]

uhhhhh can we just stop banning things?!!! heavens above - rules rules rules..... I swear this town is turning into an episode of grumpy old men. Live a little, play some music after dark, sunbathe naked in your back garden, sit around a bonfire telling war stories. Whatever you do, smoke out these constant tiresome sour people, starting with that hideously surly woman in xxx and ending with pretty much all the staff in the xxx. #middleclassdramarama

[Alex K]

Oh dear. We do like our burgers (and shortly after payday our butterflied leg of lamb, although we take the bone out ourselves and buy the original leg at the Co-Op, not at William Rose) slightly carbonised.

We worry about kippering the neighbours. And we do take a look two houses down, two houses up in the terrace, from the rear window in the back, to see that no one has laundry on the line before we light the pyre.

Now and again we ourselves are lightly kippered (when neighbours upwind offer sacrifice). We cough, just a bit, and close the windows.

All part of getting along, eh?

[the-e-dealer]

I have decided to ban banning things for three months.