Rangeland Wildfires
Illustration by Kelly Finan
What is a rangeland?
A rangeland is an area dominated by grasses, wildflowers (forbs), or shrubs. Rangelands take many forms.
Rangeland ecosystems are found throughout the U.S., but are predominantly located in the West.
What is a wildfire?
A wildfire is an unplanned or uncontrolled fire in a natural area. More than half of wildfires in the conterminous U.S. (excluding Alaska and Hawaii) occur in rangelands.
People think wildfires look like this . . . But wildfires more often look like this . . .
More than half of wildfires burn in rangelands.
Map of rangelands and forests in the conterminous U.S. (credit: Jacob Shelly, NAU). Text from Crist 2023 .
LOCAL fire departments spend 39% of their time on rangeland wildfires versus 7% of their time on forest wildfires.
Proportion of time spent by local fire departments on rangeland (left) versus forest (right) wildfires.
Just like forests, rangelands need various amounts of fire to function properly, but also like forests, wildfires can negatively impact:
- Communities
- Livelihoods
- Recreation
- Soils
- Air quality
- Water quality
- Native plant communities and forage availability
- Wildlife habitat
What can we do about it?
This photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-ND
- Increase media awareness: Currently forest wildfires receive 94% of media coverage
- Provide easily accessible, non-technical science-based information to journalists and others
- Support actions that limit invasive grass impacts
- Manage the expansion of woody fuels
- Increase community awareness and preparation (see the Wildfire Adaptation Resource Hub )
Learn more
- Rethinking the focus on forest fires in federal wildland fire management. Or its summary .
- Rising wildfire risk to houses in the United States, especially in grasslands and shrublands
- Climate change and wildfire in Northwest rangelands
- Getting ahead of large rangeland fires in the Great Basin
- America's "sagebrush sea" in the West is going up in smoke: Will anyone help?
- Big sagebrush fire ecology and management
- Fire in the Sonoran Desert
- California Chaparral Symposium videos and summary
- California wildland fires burning mostly in non-forests
- Prescribed fire in Texas Panhandle community saved it from wildfire
- Wildfire fuels management practices in grass-dominated landscapes
- Wildfire: Preparing the ranch and farm . And in Spanish .
If you'd like to share this information, contact the Great Basin Fire Science Exchange for postcards!
