Prescribed burns to take place in Morro Bay State Park

If you see smoke and flames in Morro Bay State Park in the next two weeks, don’t worry.

Those fires are part of prescribed pile burns coordinated by the SLO County Air Pollution Control District, the Morro Bay Fire Department and State Parks.

Starting Wednesday, the departments will be burning diseased, dead and downed Monterey pines and doing landscape burning in the Black Hill and campground areas of the state park, according to a news release from the fire department. The goal of the burns is to reduce the possibility of wildfires, keep native plant communities healthy, restore nutrients to the soil and help control the spread of pine pitch canker disease, which affects Monterey pines.

The fire department asks everyone to exercise caution when driving near the burn areas. More information regarding air quality can be found at the APCD website or at 805-781-4390.

This story was originally published March 14, 2017 at 5:29 PM with the headline "Prescribed burns to take place in Morro Bay State Park."