Western Fire Map (1870-2007)

A summary data set of all fire polygons we could locate as of December 2007. We used multiple datasets to develop this layer including data gathered from the internet, publically available databases, and personal contacts with dozens of agency personnel throught the western U.S. Data were assessed for utility (but not accuracy) and formatted for consistency. Each source data set was then attributed consistently with fields for record number and year (of fire). Because various resource management entities map fires somewhat independently (especially in more recent years) we merged overlapping polygons for each year. Users are encouraged to understand the contents of this data file before using it.