Karhu Wildfire Management LLC

Karhu Wildfire Management LLC, a self-certified small disadvantaged business based in Stevenson, Washington, provides wildfire suppression equipment, water handling services, and incident management personnel to the Department of Agriculture Forest Service as a prime contractor operating exclusively under small business set-asides. The company works 100% as a prime, with no subcontract activity in the source data.

Karhu Wildfire Management's federal customer base concentrates entirely within the Department of Agriculture Forest Service ecosystem across four functional units. The National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) anchors the majority of contract value at $1 million combined potential across three IDIQs, while the Forest Service's Pacific Southwest Region (R5) represents $158 thousand across three delivery orders focused on California national forests, the Eastern Region (R9) accounts for $138 thousand in a single July 2026 delivery order into Duluth, Minnesota, and unspecified Forest Service regional offices hold $48 thousand across three delivery orders. This customer concentration (100% coverage under the top four organizational buyers within a single federal agency) reflects specialization in interagency wildfire incident response.

Karhu Wildfire Management holds two active indefinite-delivery contracts through the National Interagency Fire Center's Virtual Incident Procurement (VIPR) system, both firm fixed price multiple-award vehicles on total small business set-aside basis. The first, awarded February 6, 2026, carries a $500 thousand ceiling through May 30, 2030, and covers water handling services across East Zone Regions 1, 2, 4, and 9. The second, awarded May 30, 2025, carries a $250 thousand ceiling through May 30, 2030, and also covers East Zone water handling across Regions 1, 2, 4, and 9. A third IDIQ, awarded June 2, 2022, with a $250 thousand ceiling and completion date of May 30, 2025, covered water handling for Regions 1, 2, 4, 8, and 9 across the NIFC system. Task orders issued against these vehicles total approximately $205 thousand under the older IDIQ (1202SB22T7643) and $138 thousand under the newer IDIQ (1202SB26T7527). Representative delivery orders include $62 thousand awarded August 10, 2022, for wildfire management services in California's Sierra Nevada region, $56 thousand awarded August 16, 2023, for prevention and response services in Yreka, and $138 thousand awarded July 20, 2026, for wildfire management in Minnesota's Duluth area.

Activity is episodic (three awards in 2022, one in 2023, three in 2024, one in 2025, two in 2026) with low obligations relative to contract ceilings—$343 thousand obligated against $1.3 million combined potential value across all awards (26% obligation rate). All work falls under NAICS 541712 (Support Activities for Forestry) and PSC code for natural resources/conservation forest-range fire suppression, narrowing Karhu's federal footprint to a specialized incident-response niche within Forest Service wildfire logistics.