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April 17, 2020Belle Plaine, Kan. |  By: AP

Kansas ranchers burn land despite plea from health officials

BELLE PLAINE, Kan. (AP) - Kansas ranchers eager to prepare their land for cattle grazing have mostly brushed off the plea from state health officials to voluntarily cut back this spring's prairie burning so as to reduce air pollution during the coronavirus pandemic.

Air quality monitors this past week have picked up "significantly high readings" downwind from Kansas in the Lincoln and Omaha areas of Nebraska, with smoke from Kansas reaching as far north as South Dakota.

Rick Brunetti, director of the Bureau of Air at at the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, says they are seeing very little, if any, reduction in the amount of burning in Kansas.