We have a fire ban -- comprende?

A close call at Whangape has prompted another warning that the Far North remains tinder dry, and a fire ban, imposed in October, has yet to be lifted.

That means that no outdoor fire may be lit anywhere in the Far North without a permit, although Kaitaia Fire Brigade spokesman Ross Beddows would be a little happier if people just watched the fires they had started.

The Kaitaia brigade had been called out eight times, mostly to rubbish fires, between Friday last week and Tuesday, Station Officer Beddows said.

"The most serious of those was on Tuesday, at a property at Whangape, where a small rubbish fire lit the previous day reignited and spread rapidly through long grass, threatening two houses," he said.

"The owners returned to find neighbours and the local rural delivery postie [volunteer firefighter Andre Meads] tackling the flames as best they could with a garden hose and shovels."

Two crews from Kaitaia and one from Ahipara quickly had the fire under control, but not before it had burned 200 metres up a hill, sweeping under one of the houses and burning within a metre of the other. A small wooden shed was just about to go up when the firefighters arrived.

The wooden piles of one house were charred, a small footbridge was destroyed, and a large area of kikuyu and part of a fenceline were burned.

Mr Beddows had no doubt that the crews would have been fighting a house fire had it not been for the prompt actions of Mr Meads and the neighbours.

"This is a timely reminder of how dry parts of the North still are," he added.

"Fires may be lit with a permit, but wind and weather conditions are often not being taken into account. No fire - no matter how small - should be left unattended."

Further evidence of "poor judgement" had been evident at Pamapuria on Monday afternoon, when a fire was lit in an area surrounded by long grass, which soon ignited. The flames rapidly spread up a hill, and while no property was endangered State Highway 1 was enveloped in smoke.

Two appliances attended another uncontrolled rubbish fire after it got into dry grass at Waimanoni on Friday, and Kaitaia's tanker was turned back from a scrub fire at Motukaraka on Saturday, Mr Beddows saying Kohukohu firefighters had done well to bring what appeared to be a potentially dangerous blaze under control.

"Also on Tuesday we were turned back from Pukenui when a fire there was found to be covered by a permit, and just before midnight on Tuesday a late night cook-up at a Grigg Street home went awry. The pot had been forgotten about, and the contents were definitely well done when we arrived to ventilate the home with a positive pressure fan," he said.

"It was good to see and hear a smoke alarm though. At least that message appears to be getting through."