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Management

Daily Prescribed Fire Activity

Prescribed burns normally occur in the spring and fall depending upon weather and fuel conditions, but can also occur during the winter. Expect light to moderate smoke in areas near prescribed burning operations. Read more about Smoke information. Prescribed burns do not occur during burn bans.

Please note:  Planned burns are subject to change without notice due to weather and smoke impact to communities. Fire specialists will cease burning if objectives are not being met. 

The best way to find where a prescribed burn is happening in the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest is to check the following:

This week's prescribed fire activity:

April 25, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on the Cle Elum Ranger District. Crews will continue burning the remaining 100 acres in the Swauk Pine project unit located 20 miles northeast of Cle Elum, WA. Smoke will be visible from Hwy. 97, Liberty, and possibly Interstate 90.

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April 24, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on two ranger districts:

  • Methow Valley Ranger District crews will burn 120 acres in the Elderberry unit of the Libby project located 3.6 miles northwest of Carlton, WA; smoke may be visible from Methow to Winthrop, WA.
  • Cle Elum Ranger District crews will be burning 150 acres in the Swauk Pine project unit located 20 miles northeast of Cle Elum, WA. Smoke will be visible from Highway 97, the town of Liberty, and possibly Interstate 90.

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April 23, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on the Chelan Ranger District. Crews will burn 150 acres in the Falls Coyote Unit located 21 miles northwest of Chelan, WA. Smoke may be visible from Chelan and Manson, WA.  Accomplishment:  Crews burned 150 acres.

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April 22, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on two ranger districts: 

  • Chelan Ranger District: 250 acres in the Falls Coyote Unit located 21 miles northwest of Chelan, WA. Smoke may be visible from Chelan and Manson, WA.
  • Methow Valley Ranger District:  330 acres in the Hornet Draw Unit located in Libby Creek, 3.5 miles west of Carlton, WA.

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April 17-20, 2025:   Prescribed burning will be occurring on three ranger districts.

  • Methow Valley Ranger District crews will be burning 750 acres in the Smith Canyon unit (located 3 miles NW of Carlton, WA), on April 18 and possibly over the weekend. Smoke will be visible from Winthrop, Twisp, Carlton, and the town of Methow.
  • Naches Ranger District crews will be burning 1,450 acres in the Canteen units, located 15 miles NW of Naches, WA, on April 18; smoke will be visible from Ellensburg and Yakima.
  • Chelan Ranger District personnel plan to burn 300 acres at Washington Creek, 9 miles north of Chelan, WA, on April 18 & 19. Smoke may be visible from Echo Ridge, Brewster, and Chelan.

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April 14-18, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on three ranger districts this week.

  • Methow Valley Ranger District:  100 acres at the Elderberry unit, 4 miles NW of Carlton, WA on April 15, and possibly burning 750 acres at Smith Canyon 3 miles NW of Carlton, WA on April 18.
  • Chelan Ranger District:  300 acres at Bear Mtn, 7 miles west of Chelan, WA on April 14 and 15 followed by 300 acres at Washington Creek, 9 miles north of Chelan, WA on April 18
  • Wenatchee River Ranger District:  20 acres in the Beehive Unit, 6 miles southwest of Wenatchee, WA on April 14. 

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April 11, 2025:  Forest Service crews will be underburning 500 acres in the Martin Ranch area of Number 2 Canyon 4 miles west of Wenatchee on April 12-14, and 100 acres in the Beehive area 6 miles southwest of Wenatchee on April 12 or 13. These burns are weather dependent, they will be postponed if weather conditions change. Smoke will be visible to surrounding communities.

Accomplishments:  Crews successfully burned 335 acres at Martin Ranch and 55 acres at Beehive.

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April 4 & 6, 2025:  Plans are to burn the remaining 700 acres in the Gold Ridge Unit on April 4, smoke will be very visible. On April 6, Chelan Ranger District personnel will burn 200 acres at Washington Creek, about 8 miles north of Chelan; smoke will be visible from Echo Ridge and Antoine Creek.

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April 3, 2025: Prescribed burning will be occurring on the Entiat Ranger District. Crews will be burning 100 acres in the Gold Ridge prescribed burn unit located 10 miles northwest of Entiat, WA and approx. 1.5 miles northwest of Ardenvoir, WA. Smoke will be visible from Ardenvoir.

Accomplishment:  Crews successfully burned 100acres.

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March 26, 2025:  Prescribed burning will occur on two Ranger Districts:

  • Entiat Ranger District crews will burn 100 acres in the Gold Ridge prescribed burn unit located 10 miles northwest of Entiat, WA, and approx. 1.5 miles northwest of Ardenvoir, WA. Smoke will be visible from Ardenvoir.
  • Wenatchee River Ranger District crews will burn approx. 100 acres in the Martin Ranch area located 5 miles southwest of Wenatchee. Smoke will be visible from Wenatchee and Cashmere.
    • Accomplishments:  100 acres in the Gold Ridge burn and 66 acres in the Martin Ranch burn

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March 18, 2025:  Methow Valley Ranger District crews will be burning two piles of forest debris in the Upper Rendezvous area located 6 miles northwest of Winthrop, WA. 

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March 12 & 13, 2025: Prescribed burning of 2 acres of landing piles will be occurring in the Libby Creek drainage approx. 4 miles west of Carlton, WA. These piles must be burned to alleviate fire control issues during future underburns.

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March 6, 2025:  The Chelan Ranger District plans to complete around 200 acres of under burning in the Falls unit on the north shore of Lake Chelan. Burning will be completed using Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS).

Accomplishment:  Crews successfully underburned 200 acres.

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March 4, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on the Chelan Ranger District. Crews will be burning one acre of repair piles created during the Pioneer Fire. These piles are located at Mitchell Creek Campground approximately 6 miles north of Manson, WA.

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February 20th, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on the Chelan Ranger District. Crews will be burning 2 acres of Pioneer Fire repair piles located along the groomed snowmobile trail on Road 8020 one mile south of Cooper Mountain and 11 miles north of Chelan, WA.

Accomplishment: One acre of piles was burned. There was too much snow to ignite the other piles.

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February 19th, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be occurring on the Cle Elum Ranger District. Burning is contingent upon favorable weather and fuel conditions.

Crews will be burning 85 acres of machine constructed piles of forest debris in the Taneum Creek area, 5-8 miles south of Cle Elum, WA. Plans are to burn Taneum units 6, 22, 24, and 25 (for the exact location of these units visit the interactive map at tinyurl.com/harqnw8). These piles are located along Forest Service Roads 3300 and 3330.

Smoke may be visible to I-90 travelers and surrounding communities.

Accomplishment:  Crews successfully burned 60 acres of forest debris piles.

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February 11th, 2025:  Prescribed burning will be happening on the Cle Elum Ranger District. Crews will burn 8-10 large landing piles (or approx. 80 acres) of forest debris near Hurley Creek Road No. 9711 in the Blewett Pass area 17 miles northeast of Cle Elum, WA. Smoke will be visible to Liberty residents and surrounding areas.

Accomplishment:  Crews successfully burned 80 acres of landing piles.

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February 5th, 2025: Prescribed pile burning will be occurring on Feb. 5.  Burning is contingent upon favorable weather and fuel conditions.

Methow Valley Ranger District personnel will burn eight large landing piles in the Libby Creek drainage 7 miles northwest of Carlton, WA. Approximately 50 acres of piles will be burned in the southeast portion of the Mission Creek Unit. Smoke will be visible in the Libby Creek drainage.

The goal is to remove the landing piles so when underburning occurs there later this year there won’t be issues from smoldering landing piles.

Accomplishment:  Crews successfully burned 50 acres of landing piles.

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January 29th and 30th, 2025:  Prescribed pile burning will be occurring on two ranger districts. Burning is contingent upon favorable weather and fuel conditions.

Wenatchee River  Ranger District staff will be burning piles on Jan. 29 and Jan. 30. Crews will burn 200 acres of piles of forest debris located in between Stevens Canyon and Posey Canyon about 2 miles northeast of Leavenworth. Smoke will be visible from Leavenworth and Cashmere.

UPDATE on Jan. 29--The pile burning that had been planned in the Libby Creek area on the Methow Valley Ranger District for Jan. 30 has been postponed until next week when more favorable smoke dispersal conditions are forecast.

Pile burning is a prescribed fire used to ignite hand or machine created piles of cut vegetation resulting from vegetation or fuel management activities. Piles are generally burned during the wet season, or during winter, to reduce damage to the residual trees and to confine the fire to the footprint of the pile. Pile burning allows time for the vegetative material to dry out and will produce less overall smoke by burning hot and clean.

Accomplishment:  Crews were able to burn 10 acres of piles. Due to too much snow in the burn units, no burning will occur on Jan. 30.

Last updated May 16th, 2025

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