How to Prepare Your Home and Property For Canadian Wildfire Season - A Complete Checklist

The numbers tell a clear story. According to the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System, 2025 saw 6,127 fires burn 8,922,148 hectares nationally — trailing only the record 2023 season. Three consecutive severe fire years have made it clear that this isn't a bad streak. It's the new baseline.

What's changed is the geographic spread. Ontario's official 2025 fire-season summary reported 643 wildland fires and 597,654 hectares burned, prompting the province to add 68 permanent firefighting positions and invest in six new waterbombers.

Meanwhile, mountain towns across Alberta fast-tracked FireSmart prep after the devastating 2024 Jasper wildfire, which destroyed over a third of the townsite's structures.

The lesson from Jasper, Kelowna, Lytton, and Fort McMurray is the same: embers travel. During the 2023 McDougall Creek fire near Kelowna, embers flew roughly 2.5 kilometres across Okanagan Lake and ignited homes on the opposite shore. Your home doesn't need to be next to a forest to be at risk. It needs to be within ember range — and that range can be surprisingly far.

FireSmart Canada organizes wildfire preparation around three concentric zones radiating outward from your home. Each zone has different priorities, and the zone closest to your walls is the one that matters most.

These distances come from the FireSmart BC Homeowners Manual, which is the most detailed government-published resource on the zone framework.

Alberta's provincial guidance uses the same distances and specifically recommends that homeowners remove items that can burn from within 1.5 metres of any structure as a baseline.

The non-combustible zone — that first 1.5 metres — is where most preventable home losses begin. Dried leaves against a foundation wall, a wooden planter box beside a door, a pile of cardboard in a carport. These are the things that catch an ember and give it somewhere to grow. Clearing this zone is the single highest-return action on this entire checklist, and it costs nothing but an afternoon.

After clearing your zones, the next highest-impact work involves the materials your home is actually built with. Some components are far more vulnerable than others, and understanding where embers find their way in can help you prioritize upgrades.

Roofing

Your roof is your home's largest surface area exposed to the sky, and it's where airborne embers are most likely to land. FireSmart Canada's construction guidance identifies the roof as one of the most vulnerable components and recommends Class A fire-rated materials — asphalt fibreglass shingles, metal roofing, clay or concrete tile, or slate.

If your roof is aging and you're planning a replacement, choosing a Class A rated material is one of the most impactful fire-resilience upgrades you can make. If you're not sure where to start with that process, our guide to hiring a roofer in Canada covers what to ask and what a good quote looks like.

Between replacements, keep your roof and gutters clear of pine needles, leaves, and debris. Accumulated organic matter in gutters or valleys is exactly the kind of material that catches and holds an ember.

Siding

FireSmart Canada warns that some siding materials — particularly vinyl — can melt under high heat, allowing flames to reach the underlying wall structure. Stucco, brick, fibre-cement board, and poured concrete all offer superior fire resistance. If your home currently has vinyl siding and you live in a wildfire-prone area, upgrading to fibre-cement (such as HardiePlank) or stucco is worth considering during any planned renovation. A renovation permit may be required depending on the scope of work and your municipality.

Vents, Soffits, and Eaves

Soffit vents, gable vents, and ridge vents are designed to move air — and they also move embers. Standard mesh screening (6mm or larger openings) allows embers to enter your attic space. Upgrading to 3mm corrosion-resistant metal mesh is one of the most cost-effective fire-hardening improvements you can make. Non-combustible fascia and soffits (metal or fibre-cement) provide additional protection for the vulnerable under-eave area.

Decking and Fencing

Wooden decks and fences that connect directly to the house act as fire bridges — they can carry flames from the yard right to your walls. If you're building or replacing a deck, non-combustible or fire-resistant decking materials are the safer choice. For existing wooden decks, keeping the area underneath clear of debris and stored items is critical, since embers that land under a deck can ignite material that's out of sight. Where a wooden fence attaches to your home, consider replacing the first section (the connecting post and panels) with metal or another non-combustible material to break the fire path.

Wildfire preparation isn't just about your property. It's also about your policy. Most standard Canadian home insurance policies cover fire and smoke damage to your principal residence, but what many homeowners don't realize is how specific the limits and exclusions can be.

The Insurance Bureau of Canada's wildfire page confirms that fire and smoke damage from wildfires is typically covered, and that many policies include a "Declaration of Emergency Endorsement" that can extend policy terms when a government-declared emergency prevents timely renewal. That's worth knowing if you're evacuated and your renewal date passes while you're away from home.

What's often not covered — or covered only up to a low sublimit — includes landscaping, trees, outbuildings, and certain contents stored outside the home. Review your policy's limits for additional living expenses (ALE), which cover temporary housing and living costs if you're displaced. Some policies cap ALE at a fixed amount or a percentage of your dwelling coverage, so confirm that the limit would actually cover your family's needs for several weeks or months.

If you live in a wildfire-prone area, this is also a good time to check whether your insurer offers FireSmart-related discounts. Through the FireSmart BC Wildfire Mitigation Program, homeowners who complete a certified assessment and follow through on recommendations may qualify for insurance discounts.

BCAA offers a $100 benefit plus a 5% ongoing premium reduction for eligible customers, and Co-operators offers similar FireSmart discounts in participating regions.

It's worth noting that FireSmart assessments are confidential — the program does not share assessment details with insurers, even though insurers may offer discounts for completed work. Booking an assessment won't automatically feed your insurer property-risk information.

If an evacuation order comes, you may have very little time to leave. The federal government's wildfire preparation page recommends having a grab-and-go bag packed with enough supplies for at least 72 hours — the standard timeframe recommended by emergency preparedness officials across Canada.

Your go-bag should include water (two to four litres per person per day), non-perishable food, medications and prescriptions (with copies of prescriptions if possible), phone chargers and a portable battery pack, cash in small bills, a change of clothes and basic toiletries, an N95 mask or respirator for smoke, a flashlight with extra batteries, and supplies for pets (food, leash, carrier, vaccination records).

Keep copies of critical documents in your go-bag or accessible cloud storage: your home insurance policy and insurer's contact number, government-issued ID (passports, driver's licences), birth certificates, social insurance number cards, and your household emergency plan.

B.C.'s PreparedBC wildfire guide also recommends knowing your evacuation routes (have at least two), arranging transportation in advance if you don't drive, planning for pets and livestock, and signing up for local emergency alerts. Confirm that your mobile phone is compatible with Alert Ready, Canada's national emergency alerting system — this is how evacuation orders and emergency instructions will reach you.

If wildfire is imminent and you've received an alert or evacuation order, the FireSmart BC Emergency Preparedness Checklist provides a structured set of same-day actions that go beyond the long-term preparation you've already done.

Close all windows and doors. Move combustible items — patio furniture, doormats, cushions, garbage bins — away from the house. Shut off your gas if fire officials advise it. Connect garden hoses and fill buckets or bins with water if time permits. Leave exterior lights on so your home is visible to emergency crews in smoke conditions. Make sure your house number is clearly visible from the road. And then leave when you're told to leave — don't wait to see if it gets worse.

One of the most practical steps you can take is to find out whether your municipality offers a FireSmart assessment program. Many do, particularly in British Columbia and Alberta, and they're typically free.

The City of Kamloops reopened its FireSmart assessment program for 2026 and launched a new FireSmart Home Improvement Rebate program for 2026–2027, funded by a $200,000 grant from Intact Financial Corporation. Homeowners who receive an assessment from Kamloops Fire Rescue can apply for rebates covering specified mitigation work — upgrades to vents, gutters, roofing, siding, and vegetation within 30 metres.

The Thompson-Nicola Regional District launched a rebate program for 2026 offering up to 50% of costs to a maximum of $1,000 for fire mitigation work within 30 metres of a home. The City of Merritt runs a similar program capping rebates at $2,500 per property. The Cowichan region's program offers up to $4,000 for completing recommended FireSmart mitigation activities.

These programs exist because municipalities know that wildfire resilience is built one property at a time. Check with your local fire department or regional district — programs like these are expanding as climate risk grows, and new ones appear each year. Provincial CRI (Community Resiliency Investment) funding supports many of them.

Wildfire season in most of Canada runs from approximately March through October, with peak risk typically between May and August. Alberta officially defines its season as March 1 to October 31. Here's a practical timing guide:

Early spring (March–April): Complete your Zone 1 and Zone 2 clearing. Remove accumulated winter debris from your roof and gutters. Check that your go-bag is current — replace expired medications, update documents, recharge battery packs. Review your home insurance policy and confirm your coverage limits. Book a FireSmart assessment if your municipality offers them.

Before peak season (May): Move firewood, propane tanks, and other combustible storage to at least 10 metres from your home. Check vent screens for damage or gaps. Mow grass short in Zones 1 and 2. Test your smoke alarms and make sure you have a working fire extinguisher on each level of your home. Confirm your Alert Ready compatibility and sign up for local emergency notifications.

During fire season (June–September): Monitor local fire conditions through your province's wildfire information system. Keep your property clear of new accumulations of debris. If you're leaving town, ensure a neighbour or family member knows your emergency plan. Keep your go-bag accessible — not buried in a closet.

Post-season (October–November): Assess any damage from the season. Clean gutters one final time. Note any building-material upgrades you want to make over the winter. Research rebate programs for the following year — applications for many programs open in early spring.