Badger Creek Fire Planting Project is Underway

In June of 2018, a wildfire known as the Badger Creek Fire stormed through southern Wyoming in the Medicine Bow National Forest. Over the course of a few days the fire rapidly grew to over 21,400 acres and evacuations of nearby communities occurred. The fire then burned for much of the summer before containment and control were declared. The cause of the fire remains under investigation to this day.


Badger Creek fire in 2018 | Natural regeneration within the burned area | Seedlings ready for planting from the FS Bessey Nursery

Fast forward five years later and regrowth in most areas is well under way. Natural regeneration occurs after most wildfires on the Medicine Bow National Forest, and most of the Badger Creek burned area is no exception. However, a small portion of the Badger Creek Fire burned so hot that natural growth is not occurring as expected, and so a planting project was created. But where exactly does the Forest Service get enough trees to replant 300 acres of burned area?

Opened in 1902, the Forest Service Bessey Nursery in Halsey, Neb. is the oldest tree nursery managed by the USDA Forest Service. The Bessey Nursery receives over 1.5 million seedling requests every year. One of those requests came from the Medicine Bow National Forest for seedlings to populate the areas of high-intensity burn. So, over the last year the nursery has been growing and storing seedlings that would soon call the Medicine Bow National Forest their new home.

While in the federal nursery, the trees were grown in medium like flowers that are planted in home gardens. The seedlings were removed from growing containers and frozen for storage in the fall of 2022. In spring of 2023, seedlings were shipped to the Laramie Ranger District and stored in a walk-in cooler where they thawed before being planted.


Walk-in cooler from the Laramie Ranger District that held the seedlings | Contract crew using hoedads to plant the seedlings | Newly planted seedling

The seedlings were then used in May and June of 2023 as part of the planting project in the Badger Creek fire area. Before planting, areas within the fire perimeter were surveyed to quantify tree regeneration. The areas chosen were determined to be below stocking levels to meet forest plan objectives. A contract crew was hired to plant the seedlings using hand tools (hoedads).

This specific project location had two types of treatment occur prior to planting. Approximately 40 acres was masticated, 100 acres was trampled with a bulldozer, and 160 acres was left standing. The purpose of the varied treatment types is to study the effect of the different Forest conditions on seedling survival.

In total, 156,200 seedings have been and will be planted as part of this project. Monitoring of seedling survival rates will take place after the 1st (2024) and 3rd (2026) growing seasons.

While most of the Badger Creek burned area of the Medicine Bow National Forest is successfully regenerating naturally, the goal of this planting project is to provide supplemental growth to the scorched areas that were determined to be under stocked while also learning new techniques for future uses.

For more information about the project call Timothy Douville, Silviculture Forester with the Laramie Ranger District Office

Phone: (307) 745-2300

Hours: 8 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., Monday - Friday

(planting project information and photos provided by Silviculture Forester Tim Douville)