The Lasting Toll of Wildfire Damage

Wildfires have long been a devastating reality across the West. They can wipe out orchards, leave pastures unable to support cattle, send smoke into nearby vineyards and blacken entire mountainsides. The destruction is heartbreaking, and the damage continues long after the flames are extinguished.

Wildfire Damage Reaches Far Beyond Burned Acres

My trip to Washington state last week was a powerful reminder of just how far that damage can reach. Wildfires create a seemingly endless domino effect of damage for farmers and ranchers. It’s a scene playing out in states across the country. According to the National Interagency Fire Center, in late September, 56 uncontained large fires are burning in 12 states. More than 8 million acres have burned this year. In Nebraska alone, more than 750,000 acres of grazing lands have been blackened. When grazing land burns, ranchers do not just lose grass for a season. They are left scrambling for feed, replacing miles of fence and wondering how long it will take the land to recover.

And the damage doesn’t stop at the fire line. Ash, soot and retardant runoff can threaten the water farmers rely on for livestock and irrigation. Wildlife displaced by fires may also move onto farms and into communities. In Washington, farmers shared stories of elk, moose, deer and bears raiding bins of apples and fields of vegetables, damaging trees and fences, and sometimes being struck on roadways.

Specialty Crop Growers Face Mounting Losses

These challenges are hitting farmers who were already struggling to make the numbers work. Specialty crops, including fruits, nuts and vegetables, are a major part of Washington’s economy, but growers are being squeezed from every direction. In 2025, rising labor, input, storage, packing and compliance costs led to more than $7 billion in losses across just six specialty crops. After waiting months for USDA aid intended to address those losses, apple growers still lost more than $4,000 per acre. The assistance covered less than 5% of the estimated loss. No farm can sustain losses like that for long.

The numbers are staggering, but the “for sale” signs I saw in front of orchard after orchard made the situation hit home. Washington grows more than two-thirds of our nation’s apples, and apple growers in other states are struggling, too. Americans have made clear that they want homegrown food, yet we increasingly rely on imported food as U.S. farms and ranches struggle to hang on.

Farmers Need Help Recovering and Rebuilding

Growers recovering from wildfires need help getting back on their feet. We need lawmakers to continue improving tools like federal crop insurance so they provide meaningful, affordable protection for the unique risks farmers face in this part of the country. When disaster strikes, assistance needs to arrive in time to make a difference and account for not only the crop that was lost, but also trees that can take years to replace. We also need updated credit and loan programs that help farmers continue to farm and plan for the future. And we need federal land management laws that support responsible timber harvesting, allow grazing infrastructure to be maintained, and help reduce the risk and spread of wildfires.

The farmers and ranchers I visited with last week are not ready to give up. They want to keep doing what they love. There’s just something about farming that gets in your blood. Maybe it’s the satisfaction of bringing healthy calves into the world and seeing those apples turn red after months of hard work. Maybe it’s knowing the work you do helps put food on tables across America. I guess it’s all of the above. But passion can’t make the numbers add up, and it can’t convince a bank to extend another loan when a farm is already underwater.

That’s why lawmakers need to act with urgency. Passage of the farm bill in the Senate Ag Committee was an important step forward. The bill would help growers replace damaged trees sooner, improve crop insurance for wildfire losses, update loan limits, help ranchers rebuild grazing infrastructure, and strengthen efforts to prevent wildfires. Now Congress must finish the job and send a strong, bipartisan farm bill to the President’s desk by the end of the year. Farmers and ranchers need solutions that will help them recover today and keep feeding America’s families for years to come.