Fire crews responded to a suspicious fire on Monday night in the Silverstream area, near Dunedin.
A Fire and Emergency New Zealand spokesman said four appliances attended the blaze at the intersection of Silver Stream Valley Rd and Three Mile Hill Rd at 9.48pm.
A crew from Mosgiel attended the blaze first, and called for a second pump and two tankers.
A pump from Roslyn fire station attended along with tankers from the Portobello and Wakari fire stations.
Toetoe fires are "notoriously hard to extinguish", the spokesman said.
Fire crews returned to the scene in the early hours of the morning to extinguish a flare-up, at 2.41 am.
The initial fire was contained at 10.30pm, with about 180 square metres being burned.
The fire was being treated as suspicious as a resident said he saw children throw something on the side of the road and it burst into flames.
"There was a bit of a boom and then a couple of toetoes were on fire.
"It wasn’t that eventful, it just looked good sitting on the deck watching it for a while," he said.
