Coming from a family of farmers from both my father and my mother sides I remember my father mentioning this technique to me as I was a kid and we were seeing a

Coming from a family of farmers from both my father and my mother sides I remember my father mentioning this technique to me as I was a kid and we were seeing a "wild" fire in the distance (Beauce/Sologne region in France). He would say farmers would do it and pretend it was accidental, out of any legal context. I don't know if the practice is fully forbidden or just very restricted. But it's probably well known.