Florida Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam is stressing caution as fires rage across the state.
He says the comparison to last year is striking.
“A year ago there had been under 1,000 fires about 900 fires covering 15,000 acres,” Putnam says. “This year, in that same time period there have been almost 1,600 fires covering 124,000 total acres state and federal lands.”
In terms of acres, that’s an increase of more than 400 percent. Governor Rick Scott declared a state of emergency last week to help fight fires.
