Sleeping Buffalo, MT
Sleeping Buffalo wildfire risk explained
Sleeping Buffalo's 50 buildings earn a 60th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Sleeping Buffalo at the 58th percentile, close to its 60th-percentile risk score.
Sleeping Buffalo's building exposure, zone by zone
Direct exposure dominates in Sleeping Buffalo: 98% of its 50 buildings, versus 2% Indirect and 0% Minimal. Clearing space around a structure changes the outcome here more than any single building-material swap.
Sleeping Buffalo against the rest of the country
Sleeping Buffalo's 60th national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 24th ranking inside Montana does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 36 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Sleeping Buffalo ranks 12,703 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 30,933 by building count (1 is largest). Within Montana alone, it ranks 363 of 475 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Montana on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Sleeping Buffalo's elevated rating (60th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Sleeping Buffalo's 98% 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.
Where Sleeping Buffalo's figures come from
Sleeping Buffalo's 60th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Sleeping Buffalo's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.