Wyoming Burn Permit: Do You Need One and When

Q: Do I need a permit to burn leaves in Wyoming?

Not a permit, but you cannot simply light one either: Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division wants to hear from you first, jurisdictional fire authority and county fire warden.

Q: Does a burn ban override a permit in Wyoming?

A permit or a notification settles whether you may burn at all. Whether today is a day for it is a separate question, answered each morning by fire danger ratings, burn bans and air quality forecasts, and several states revoke permits outright when the weather turns. Wyoming State Forestry Division posts that check, linked below.

Notify first

Permit for yard debris

Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division

No closed season

When burning is closed

the daily check is the answer

Restricted

Hours you may burn

refuse burns have to be during daytime hours

Published

Daily check

Wyoming State Forestry Division

The answer

Do you need a burn permit in Wyoming?

Notice, not a permit

No, but you have to tell someone first

Wyoming does not issue a burning permit. It asks you to notify someone before you light, and the dates come from your town, county or fire district.

Who issues it: Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division
Issued by: no state permit for a household pile; you notify the jurisdictional fire authority for your area, which is the volunteer fire department, fire district, municipal fire department or county fire warden, and any permit comes from them

Prior to the ignition of an open burn, the person or organization conducting the open burn shall communicate burn information to the public by notifying the jurisdictional fire authority(ies) responsible for the geographic area in which the open burn is to occur.

Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division, Standards and Regulations, Chapter 10 Smoke Management, effective 04/05/2005 to current, Wyoming Administrative Rules, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

Where you get one

Jurisdictional fire authority
County fire warden

When

When you may burn in Wyoming

Statewide dates

The state sets no dates. Your town, county or fire district does.

Wyoming sets no statewide open burning season; the county commissioners set fire restrictions county by county and the state's rules defer to whatever the local fire authority and local ordinances require.

Who sets it: Wyoming State Forestry Division
Checked against: Fire Restrictions, Wyoming State Forestry Division

This map depicts fire restrictions as established by the county commissioners in accordance with the State Board of Land Commissioners Rules.

Fire Restrictions, Wyoming State Forestry Division, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

The hours are part of the rule and are the piece most often missed: Wyoming allows burning refuse burns have to be during daytime hours.

Piles of brush burnt down to rings of white ash on a forest floor with smoke drifting through the pines, a single crew member in yellow standing at a distance watching them — Piles burnt down to ash at the Grand Canyon, with one person left standing over them. Almost every state permit carries the same condition in some wording: somebody stays with the fire until it is out. That attendance requirement, not the paperwork, is what most permits are really about. “Grand Canyon National Park - Prescribed Pile Burning, May, 2019”, Grand Canyon NPS, CC BY 2.0

What may burn

What you may and may not burn in Wyoming

What the state names as burnable

trees
tree stumps
tree limbs
bark
chips
duff
grass
grass clippings
leaves
conifer needles
bushes
shrubs
weeds
clippings from bushes and shrubs
agricultural plant residue
refuse generated at the same dwelling, farmstead or ranch headquarters

What it names as off the pile

natural or synthetic rubber products, including tires
waste petroleum products, such as oil or used oil filters
insulated wire
plastic products, including PVC pipe, tubing and connectors
tar, asphalt, asphalt shingles, or tar paper
railroad ties
wood, wood waste, or lumber that is painted or chemically treated
explosives or ammunition
batteries
hazardous waste products
asbestos or asbestos containing materials
materials which cause dense smoke discharges

“Vegetative material” means untreated unprocessed wood, including, but not limited to, trees, tree stumps, tree limbs, bark, chips, duff, grass, grass clippings, leaves, conifer needles, bushes, shrubs, weeds, clippings from bushes and shrubs, and agricultural plant residue.

Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division, Standards and Regulations, Chapter 10 Smoke Management, Section 2, Wyoming Administrative Rules, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

The conditions

What Wyoming asks of the weather and the site

Setbacks, wind limits and what has to be on hand. These are written into the rule rather than offered as advice.

keep the burn at least 500 feet from the nearest population, except for a fenceline, irrigation ditch or canal burn
notify the jurisdictional fire authority for your area before you light
attend and watch the burn, checking where the smoke is going
burn refuse only during daytime hours, and only refuse generated on that same dwelling, farmstead or ranch
a small vegetative burn stays under the rule only while it is below a quarter ton of PM10 emissions a day, counting every pile you burn that day on contiguous land

The open burn, except for fenceline, irrigation ditch or canal burns, shall only be conducted at least 500 feet from a population, unless a waiver of this requirement has been granted by the Administrator of the Division.

Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division, Standards and Regulations, Chapter 10 Smoke Management, Section 2, Wyoming Administrative Rules, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

The morning of

What to check before you light in Wyoming

A permit or a season says you may burn in general. What says you may burn today is separate, it changes daily on a wind and humidity forecast, and it overrides a permit already in hand. In Wyoming it is published here.

a county by county fire restrictions map, set by the county commissioners, with separate federal land restrictions linked beside it

Wyoming State Forestry Division

Click on a county for more information. Subject to information received For current fire restrictions on federal lands, please visit these websites: Bureau of Land Management Fire Restrictions

Wyoming State Forestry Division, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

A volunteer fire department letter board reading BURN BAN IN EFFECT above a Smokey Bear fire danger sign showing HIGH, with a red flag flying beside it — A volunteer fire department in Florence, Texas, posting the answer on its own sign. A burn ban is usually declared by a county judge or a local fire authority, and it closes burning that a state permit would otherwise allow. Whatever the season says, the ban is the last word. “Florence Texas VFD Burn Ban Sign”, Larry D. Moore, CC BY 4.0

Your town

What your town can add in Wyoming

The state's own rule says it does not relieve you of local laws or of any lawfully issued burn restriction, and safety is the local fire authority's call, not the state's.

Nothing in this Section shall relieve any person or organization conducting an open burn of the responsibility to comply with all applicable local, state and federal laws, regulations and ordinances. ... Nothing in this Section is intended to address safety issues related to the use of fire, which fall under the control of jurisdictional fire authorities.

Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division, Standards and Regulations, Chapter 10 Smoke Management, effective 04/05/2005 to current, Wyoming Administrative Rules, read September 23, 2026. Read it at the source

Wyoming burn permit questions

Do I need a permit to burn leaves in Wyoming?

When can you burn in Wyoming?

How do I find out if there is a burn ban in Wyoming today?

What can't you burn in Wyoming?

Wyoming names natural or synthetic rubber products, including tires, waste petroleum products, such as oil or used oil filters, insulated wire, plastic products, including PVC pipe, tubing and connectors, tar, asphalt, asphalt shingles, or tar paper and railroad ties among others. The lists across the fifty states agree on a core of it: tires, treated and painted wood, plastics, roofing and household garbage. The full list is quoted below from the state.

What are the rules for a legal burn pile in Wyoming?

Who do I call before burning in Wyoming?

Does a burn ban override a permit in Wyoming?

Why are burning rules so different from state to state?

Because two different problems wrote them. In the forested states the rule is about wildfire, so it turns on fire danger, on how close the pile is to woodland and on the hours of the day; 26 states set hours for that reason. In and around the cities the rule is about air quality, so the closed season is summer ozone or winter inversion and it is written by county. Wyoming's rule comes from Wyoming State Forestry Division, which is the clearest sign of which of the two it is.

Wyoming rules read September 23, 2026 from Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, Air Quality Division, Standards and Regulations, Chapter 10 Smoke Management, effective 04/05/2005 to current, Wyoming Administrative Rules. Rules change, a county or town may be stricter than the state, and a burn ban issued today overrides a season that is otherwise open. Every state is on the burn permit hub.