Key takeaways
- Carson City's wildfire risk to homes is higher than 98.5% of US communities and 86% of Nevada communities (USFS data).
- ZIP 89703 has no wildfire record of its own, so these figures are for Carson City as a whole.
- Start at the house: Zone 0 is the first 5 feet and the quickest to fix.
- Do the needle and leaf cleanup in spring, and walk the property again before summer.
West Carson City, ZIP 89703, sits at about 4,800 feet and borders the Sierra foothills. This checklist follows University of Nevada, Reno Extension's three zones. Confirm local requirements with your fire agency.
Why is this checklist written for the west side of Carson City?
Carson City has 17 mapped fires of 300 acres or more since 1980 with a perimeter centroid within about 10 miles of the city point. One of them, the Waterfall fire of 2004, is mapped at about 8,765 acres on the west side of town (National Interagency Fire Center perimeter data). The Census puts 48.6% of Carson City's homes at built before 1980, and 50.1% in West Carson (ZIP 89703), so many lots have mature trees and shrubs that have grown up against the house over decades.
Carson City's USFS figure is for the whole city: risk to homes higher than 98.5% of US communities, with 10.3% of buildings in the direct-exposure zone and 65.9% in the indirect zone. The ZIP code itself has no separate USFS record, so we use the city number and say so.
Zone 0 checklist: 0 to 5 feet
- Move woodpiles and firewood away from the house; the guide lists woodpiles among what to clear from this strip.
- Remove wood mulch and other combustible mulch next to the foundation.
- Rake dead leaves and pine needles out of this strip, and clear the roof edge and gutters.
- Take out junipers, sage and other high-fire-hazard plants growing against the walls.
- Use gravel, rock or pavers instead.
Zone 1 checklist: 5 to 30 feet
- Leave islands of plants with open ground between them, not a continuous mass.
- Keep the plants you keep healthy and irrigated.
- If you use mulch, keep it in patches surrounded by decomposed granite or irrigated lawn.
- Clear pine needles once in the spring.
- Prune lower tree limbs so they do not hang over shrubs; see ladder fuels and limbing up.
Zone 2 checklist: 30 to 100 feet
- Remove dead and dried vegetation.
- Separate shrubs, shrub groups and trees from each other.
- Remove low vegetation that carries fire up into tree crowns.
- Keep pine needles on the ground to 3 inches deep or less.
- Leave some living cover. The guide warns that removing everything lets cheatgrass in.
Do you need to check before working on a tree in the street right-of-way?
For a tree in the street right-of-way, check with Carson City Public Works before any work; we have not found a private-property tree removal permit in Carson City. Dead material on a neighbor's side is a conversation to have early, since fire does not stop at the fence.
Hire help for the heavy parts
Brush mowing, masticating, lot clearing and tree work near the house are jobs for equipment and a trained crew. We run a brush mower with a masticating head, a chipper and chip truck, and a certified arborist assesses the trees first. Our yard is at 6301 US Highway 50 East in Carson City. Call 775.232.8243 for a free estimate.
Sources
- University of Nevada, Reno Extension: Living With Fire (SP-23-07) (read October 17, 2026)
- USDA Forest Service: Wildfire Risk to Communities (data dated April 15, 2026) (data recorded October 1, 2026)
- National Interagency Fire Center: Interagency Fire Perimeter History and WFIGS Interagency Fire Perimeters (data pulled October 1, 2026)
- Tahoe Regional Planning Agency: Trees and Defensible Space (read October 17, 2026)