Fire Starters

As I was leaving the house one day recently, the compound suddenly filled with butterflies. As I approached each bush or tree another group would appear. The landlord was irritated. The previous evening the compound had been invaded by smoke from bush fires lit on the banks of the nearby stream. (The picture was taken from the compound.) The butterflies had lost their homes in the process and set up a temporary base with us. The phenomenon lasted a couple of days before they found somewhere more appropriate.

Lighting fires is a popular Ghanaian past time. Particularly during the dry season, you will regularly see small patches of brush burning. I was walking home from Dan’s house very late one evening when I saw a largish one near the top of the mountain. On a smaller scale, many households, including my immediate neighbours, burn their rubbish. I regularly wake with the smell of smoke in my nostrils.

You rarely see anybody managing the fires. They are just left to run their own courses. Occasionally they do get out of control, but fortunately the generally very damp conditions mean we are never faced with situations like the appalling ones recently experienced in Australia. That said, they are frowned upon and you will occasionally see appeals in the press from small communities asking the perpetrators to desist from this activity.