The Florida Forestry Service in conjunction with the Palm Beach County Parks and Recreation Department will be conducting a prescribed burn at Riverbend Park located at 9060 Indiantown Road in Jupiter on May 4, 2023. Picnic Island will be closed due to the prescribed burn.
The burn is scheduled to begin at 9:00 a.m., pending wind and weather conditions. The burn will be ignited if all the required conditions are met and will be completed within 6-8 hours.
A prescribed burn is an intentional fire set under carefully controlled conditions to achieve certain land management objectives. These conditions involve specific requirements for time of year, temperature, humidity, wind direction, wind speed, and moisture content of the vegetation to be burned.
The objectives of these burns are to reduce dead and dense vegetation, to improve habitat for wildlife and restore nutrients to the soil. Planning is under way to ensure that the burn will be done safely and efficiently. County staff has established firebreaks in preparation for these burns. The fire will be ignited in such a way that the fire will burn under control until it reaches the firebreaks, where it will be extinguished. In the unlikely event the fire threatens to escape control, the Florida Forest Service and/or Palm Beach County Fire Rescue will be stationed at the burn to quickly extinguish the fire.
Although there is no danger from the burn to surrounding homeowners, the smoke from the burn might attract attention. Residents in the immediate area of the burn who have respiratory problems may want to make arrangements to be away from home on the day of the burn. Please call Debbie Nutt at 966-6679 if you have a respiratory-related condition and need to be notified on the day of the burn. For additional information on the Parks and Recreation Prescribed Burn Program, visit
https://discover.pbcgov.org/parks/Pages/NaturalAreas.aspx.
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