The Charlton farmer received a call from a neighbour at around 10am where they had to bare the bad news.

"He told me there was smoke coming from my hay shed and that's all you had to be told really," he said.

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"We tried to get back there and hoped we might be able to save some hay, but as soon as you go to shift some bales it just all goes up.

"You're just better off to stay away and keep safe."

CFA commander Mick Sporton said four crews and 20 fire fighters were called out to the blaze on Adams Road just after 10.30am.

"The shed was well alight when crews went out," he said.

"The property owner was able to get in and get a few chaser bins out before they were ruined, but the rest was just gone.

"The fire was extremely intense when the crews arrived and given the property's distance from the Calder Highway, there's no water there.

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"Because of this, we had to use a grader to dig a mineral earth firebreak around the site and thankfully we were able to get the flames contained in the shed within the hour."

Mr McGurk said he appreciated the work local fire brigades had done to keep the blaze under control, but realised it wasn't an easy task.

"It's a good lesson to learn that you can't always make a difference when it all goes up in flames," he said.

"And it's difficult for the fire brigades to do the same because the amount of water that's required would just be phenomenal.

"We'll just have to let it take it's course now and it will probably burn for a week at least and we'll just have to make the boundary safe and keep an eye on it.

"We will monitor it until we know it's all safe and out."

Mr McGurk said while the loss from the fire would be significant, it's all part of life.

"There would have been about 1700 bales of vetch hay that would be worth around $150,000, and the shed itself would be about the same," he said.

"Some of the hay and the shed thankfully were insured, not to the full value but there will be some compensation.

"But you can come back from that, we didn't lose anyone thankfully and no one got hurt and that's all that matters."

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Mr McGurk said it was a timely reminder that combustion in hay bales can be unavoidable.

"It's very difficult when you're putting in high-density bales of hay to ascertain moisture temperature levels in every bale," he said.

"You can wait as long as you want and still hit a wet patch in your crop and honestly we thought it was very dry when it was baled so this was a bit of a surprise.

"But they tell me there are devices now that can be used to measure those moisture levels, so that's something I will look into for the future."

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Residents in the Barrakee, Charlton, Woosang, Yeungroon East are urged to keep informed.

"We will have units patrolling and keeping an eye on the site for the next 48 hours, but we want to make sure people keep their distance and contact us if they see anything unusual," Mr Sporton said.

"It is important for farmers to keep an eye on their own bales and contact the fire brigade as soon as they can to ensure the fires don't cause significant damage."

You can find more information about the community warning online at emergency.vic.gov.au

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