Rich Rowe spent three long, cold hours Wednesday morning watching the fires he lit around Bechdolt's Orchard in Lower Saucon Township slowly die, and with them the vast majority of his plum and apricot crops for the season. The orchard field manager was among the area farmers who went to great lengths during Wednesday's frigid night in an attempt to save a portion of his livelihood from the cruel temperatures. But Rowe said a phone call from a neighbor worried about a house fire sent Lower Saucon Township police to his tree-studded property at 3 a.m. Wednesday. Rowe said police did not find a structure fire — they found a farmer trying to save his crops. He and two friends had set up about 20 fires, spaced roughly 30 feet apart, that they hoped would warm the fragile plum blossoms. But authorities, citing a nuisance law in the township that forbids smoke from leaving the property where a burn is taking place, ordered Rowe to stop throwing wood on his fires, according to Rowe. Source - mcall.com