Home burned on land donated for conservation [The Leader-Telegram, Eau Claire, Wis.]

Aug. 29--About 30 years ago, firefighters with the Chippewa Fire District responded to a barn fire on the Cherrier farm in the town of Hallie.

They saved the barn.

Saturday they returned to burn it down, along with the nearby farm house.

The buildings were in poor repair, and they are on a 66-acre plot recently bought for wildlife habitat by the Chippewa Valley Chapter of Pheasants Forever. A variety of partners and grants from the state and Chippewa County allowed the group to buy the parcel for $325,000.

The land will be turned over to the state to become part of the more than 600 acre Hallie Marsh Wildlife Area.

Much of the acreage is currently planted to corn, and it will be planted to soybeans next year, but the following year it will be seeded to prairie grasses, restoring what was most likely the original vegetation before development, said Dave Carlson of Pheasants Forever.

Carlson said if you include the contiguous 80-acre Kemper Woods owned by Chippewa County, the parcel now comprises about 700 acres of publicly owned wildlife land. The area is a mix of wetlands, grasslands and woodlands available for hunting and year-round recreation, he said.

Aaron Kiraly, 17, a Stanley-Boyd High School student is considering becoming a firefighter and took a beginning firefighting class with the Chippewa Valley Technical College.

Part of the course involves working on a real fire under controlled circumstances. Each student was paired with an experienced instructor who has worked on fires, said CVTC's John Neihart. The students entered the burning farm house in small teams to put out the fire.

Fourteen students participated in Saturday's burn.

Neihart, the recently retired chief of the Chippewa Fire District, said it's important for students considering a career in firefighting to get experience with real fire early in their education.

Some decide, after entering a smoke-filled building with zero visibility, that they should pursue a different line of work, he said.

"Sometimes this is where they learn that this is not for them," he said.

Kiraly wasn't discouraged by his first experience inside a burning house.

"It was a rush," he said. "It was warm. It was quiet -- all you heard was the fire."

He was on his knees to see under the smoke, and he inhaled air from a tank on his back.

"That was kind of nice," he said of the oxygen tank and mask. "It kind of cooled off your face while you were breathing."

The fire was knocked back quickly when they hit it with the hose, but they didn't extinguish it entirely so it could be rekindled for the next student team, he said.

Neihart said the students did well.

"They all got some pretty good experience," he said.

Land in the Hallie marsh was once leased by the state Department of Natural Resources for hunting pheasants released on the property. That practice ended, leaving an 80-acre parcel of marshy state land surrounded by private land.

In 2005, the Chippewa Valley Chapter of Pheasants Forever bought a 20-acre parcel of land with the goal of providing public access to the DNR parcel. They have since had subsequent opportunities to buy adjacent land and numerous partners have helped with each purchase, Carlson said. Each parcel has been turned over to the state after each purchase -- the state's Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Fund has been a major source of grant money, he said.

Pheasants Forever paid the appraised value for the land. The Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program contributed $175,000, and Chippewa County contributed $50,000 from it's county sales-tax generated Conservation Fund.

Also contributing were the Chippewa Valley Outdoor Resource Alliance, Mason Trust Foundation, Wisconsin Chapter of the National Wild Turkey Federation, Wisconsin Waterfowl Association and the Eau Claire Rod & Gun Club.

Also, several landowners involved in this and past Hallie Marsh purchases have contributed, Carlson said.

Knight can be reached at 715-830-5835 800-236-7077 or [email protected].

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