A Cal Fire firefighter uses a drip torch to light a backfire in an effort to stop the spread of the Dixie fire in the Prattville community of unincorporated Plumas County on July 23, 2021.

With at least a dozen wildfires, some over 100,000 acres, burning in California and Oregon right now, it's hard to keep track of exactly what's going on.

An interactive map maintained by the National Alliance for Public Safety GIS Foundation (you can also find it hosted by the University of California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources) makes things a bit easier to visualize. Active and recently contained fires are shown, as well as areas that have a red flag warning (those are the purple areas). The map is not meant to be used for evacuations or real-time threats. For that, you should look to your local government's alert system or Cal Fire. 

California's biggest and most active fires right now are the Tamarack Fire near Markleeville (66,744 acres) and Dixie Fire near Quincy (181,289 acres). In Oregon, the Bootleg Fire has burned an area equivalent to half the size of Rhode Island.

The Dixie Fire just became is the largest wildfire of the year so far in California, becoming the state's second megafire of 2021 (the first was the Beckwourth Complex Fire). That's a wildfire surpassing 100,000 acres.

Megafires used to be rare, but they're becoming more and more common, especially in California, which has been hit repeatedly by extreme weather events, including heat waves, drought and dry lightning. These humongous fires were rare in California before 2003 — but 17 of the 20 largest fires in the state’s history have occurred since then, according to state data.

You can also find more information on the current wildfire situation from the Cal Fire incident page.

SFGATE news editor Amy Graff contributed to this report.

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— I had 5 minutes to evacuate from a California wildfire. Here's what I learned

For full fire coverage, visit our California wildfires page.

Katie Dowd is the SFGATE managing editor.