Much of Rowan County is a tinderbox that could erupt into wildfires, according to a county forestry official.

With the area approaching a near-record drought, the threat of wildfires continues to grow.

Volunteer fire departments battled three small blazes over the weekend.

“This is as dry as I’ve seen it in the fall,” said Rodney Kreiser, an assistant county ranger who has been in Rowan for 25 years.

“If we don’t get rain soon, we’re in for a bad fall fire season,” said Kreiser.

Although many areas across the Piedmont and state are suffering from extreme drought, there is no fire ban in effect.

Kreiser urged residents not to burn anything outside until there is significant rainfall.

Early today, Kreiser was on his way to check on a fire off China Grove Road, where firefighters doused and raked until around 10:30 p.m. Sunday.

Kreiser was checking again to see if there were any roots or stumps that might still be burning on the two-acre tract.

The fire caught from an electric fence knocked down either by a deer or a falling limb. Firefighters from China Grove, Enochville and Bostian Heights worked to control and extinguish the fire.

Early this morning, Faith and Rockwell Rural departments responded to a blaze along Faith and Crescent roads that covered nearly an acre.

Kreiser gave John Majetich of 261 N. Bellwood, Salisbury, a warning citation.

He said Majetich had raked leaves from his house and burned them Sunday evening. During the night embers in the leaves, whipped by winds, got into adjacent woods and spread quickly.

The only structure in danger was Majetich’s house, but since the leaves had been raked from around it, the fire did not reach it.

Another woods and brush fire occurred Sunday on Hawkins Avenue. Kreiser warned that the three fires Sunday may be an omen of things to come.

A bad fire season this year could be much worse than the last bad fire seasons that occurred in the spring of 1985 and 1986.

“The county is so much more populated now, there’s danger to homes,” Kreiser said.

Elsewhere across the state, as North Carolina’s lengthy dry spell continued, a wildfire broke out in Pisgah National Forest, the Associated Press said.