The North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Air Quality is reminding North Carolinians: If it doesn’t grow, don’t burn it. Open burning is only allowed in limited circumstances and only for vegetative materials like leaves, limbs and yard debris.

Officials plan to burn approximately 96 acres in Cataloochee Valley at Great Smoky Mountains National Park this week. Weather permitting, burn operations may begin as early as Tuesday, March 12. 

A slate of prescribed fires is planned through the end of May on the Cherokee National Forest in southeastern Tennessee, with some smoke impacts possible over the state line in North Carolina. 

Prescribed burns on about 1,200 acres of fields in Cades Cove are taking place this fall.