Birch Run, MI
How exposed is Birch Run to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Birch Run lands at the 5th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a figure built from its 798 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Birch Run at the 6th national percentile — 0 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Birch Run's buildings actually sit
USFS classifies 85.5% of Birch Run's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 14.5% Direct and 0% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one.
Where Birch Run ranks
There's little gap between Birch Run's 5th national percentile and its 13th percentile inside Michigan, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Birch Run ranks 29,882 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 13,650 by building count (1 is largest). Within Michigan alone, it ranks 650 of 745 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Michigan on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Birch Run's low wildfire rating (5th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Even with 85.5% of Birch Run outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones, basic hardening — gutter maintenance, ember-resistant vents — is inexpensive relative to the regional burn-probability risk noted above. Details in the home-hardening guide.
Where Birch Run's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Birch Run's 29,882-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Birch Run's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.