Fire-resistant ground covers: living plants past Zone 0

“Fire-resistant ground cover” is two questions wearing one phrase. Inside five feet of the house the answer is not a plant: IBHS Wildfire Prepared, Oregon’s State Fire Marshal and CAL FIRE all want noncombustible ground there, gravel, decomposed granite, pavers or stone. From five feet out, the published lists this site records rate 88 living ground covers fire-resistant, stonecrop⁠ first at 26 independent lists, and condemn the creeping junipers.

You are looking at the ground between the foundation and the lawn, wondering what to put down instead of bark. The first five feet are settled by the documents below. Past them, the roll on this page is the lists’ own verdicts, counted.

Why it matters

Ground cover is the fuel embers land in. That is why the five-foot band is called Zone 0 and why every document that names it wants it inert: IBHS removes vegetation and combustible groundcover there to bare mineral soil, Oregon’s fire marshal says river rock, gravel or pavers and names junipers as the plants to pull, CAL FIRE says gravel, decomposed granite, pavers, concrete or stone. Fire-resistant mulch covers the same band from the mulch side. Beyond it, a low, well-watered ground cover is what the lists recommend in Zone 1, and a resinous, litter-holding one is what they tell you to keep away.

How the rating is made

Every ground-cover record carries the verdict of each list that names it, in that list’s words. The record is fire-resistant when the balance of independent primary evidence recommends it, keep-away when the balance condemns it, a conflict when the lists disagree, and a candidate when no list has spoken in either direction. The roll orders records by how many independent lists agree; that is a count, and anyone can check it on the record.

What people mix up

• Ground cover means the plant. In the first five feet it means the surface, and the documents want it noncombustible. A fire-resistant plant does not go there (why).
• Creeping juniper is a fire-resistant ground cover. Four independent lists say the opposite, and Oregon’s fire marshal names junipers as the plants to remove from the buffer. Juniper or redcedar sorts the look-alikes.
• Artificial turf is hardscape. It is not, under the documents that name it.
• Fire-retardant and fire-resistant are the same word. Retardant is a treatment applied to wood or a chemical applied to a fire; resistant is how the lists describe a plant that resists ignition when maintained. No plant is retardant.

How to check

1. Measure five feet from the wall and from attached decks. Inside it, the surface is gravel, decomposed granite, pavers or stone.
2. From five feet out, open the record for anything you are considering. The chips are the independent lists and their direction; the evidence table quotes each.
3. Check the cited range. The Grow pages and the state table below hold the plants documented for a place.
4. Keep it low and watered. The lists rate plants as maintained; a dry mat of anything burns.

<iframe src="https://fireapproved.com/embed/plants/pacific-northwest/" title="Pacific Northwest wildfire plant table" width="100%" height="900" loading="lazy" style="border:1px solid #ddd"></iframe>
<p>Plant table from <a href="https://fireapproved.com/plants/">FireApproved.com</a>, cited to its sources. Not a planting approval.</p>

Limits

This page does not rate gravel or pavers; they are material classes with no listing. It does not decide irrigation or spacing. The lists are regional, and a rating written for the Pacific Northwest says nothing about Florida. The site issues no rating of its own; every status is a computation over the lists named on the record.