Bowler, WI
How exposed is Bowler to wildfire?
USFS scores Bowler at the 24th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range), a figure built from 227 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Bowler at the 25th national percentile — 1 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Direct exposure dominates in Bowler: 67.4% of its 227 buildings, versus 32.6% Indirect and 0% Minimal. Clearing space around a structure changes the outcome here more than any single building-material swap.
Where Bowler ranks
Bowler's 47th-percentile standing inside Wisconsin outpaces its 24th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Bowler ranks 23,845 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 23,901 by building count (1 is largest). Within Wisconsin alone, it ranks 429 of 808 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Wisconsin on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Bowler's moderate wildfire rating (24th 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.
What would actually reduce this score
Bowler's 67.4% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 227 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Bowler. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Bowler, see the exposure-zones guide.