Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.
Yes, Norway maple is generally rated fire resistant, though two sources place it in the middle rather than the lowest-flammability group.
Four of six sources give it a favorable rating. Ohio State puts it in the low-flammability band, one step above the lowest category on its five-band scale. Michigan State includes it on a wildfire-resistant list for Michigan, while the Australian Capital Territory’s plant selector marks it fire retardant. Oregon State also lists Norway maple among fire-resistant deciduous trees, with the guidance that most listed plants need some summer irrigation and must be kept healthy.
The two more cautious assessments do not call the tree highly flammable. The Forest Service and state Firewise programs rate it Moderately Firewise, the second category on a four-point scale. Their warning concerns invasive seedlings that can create plenty of flammable material in uncultivated places. Virginia Tech assigns medium flammability on its three-point scale rather than the low rating needed for its favorable category.
For a homeowner, the practical distinction is between a maintained Norway maple and unmanaged seedlings spreading beyond cultivation. The tree itself has broad support as a fire-resistant landscape choice, but its moderate ratings and seedling warning argue for irrigation, upkeep, and control of unwanted growth rather than treating it as fireproof.
Form
tree
Mature height
~50 ft
Light
Full sun
Water need
moderate
Rated in
Australian Capital Territory, Australia; Global; Michigan / Great Lakes; Ohio / Midwest +4
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
Australian Capital Territory, Australia; Global; Michigan / Great Lakes; Ohio / Midwest; Oregon; Virginia / Mid-Atlantic; eastern US; north-eastern and mid-Atlantic United States
Maintenance
Typed publication scope: 4 scopes across 4 cited fire sources
Northeastern and mid-Atlantic study sites (ME, MD, MA, NY, VA footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2007-08-20
The authors collected foliage and twigs across study sites in Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, and Virginia, then conditioned and tested the samples in a cone calorimeter. FireApproved publishes 37 exact source owners only as multi-state laboratory context. The source does not establish that every taxon was sampled in every named state, whole-plant behavior, landscape suitability, or state planting guidance.
Michigan State University Extension Bulletin E2948 is explicitly a list of wildfire-resistant landscape plants for Michigan and includes a Michigan-native field. FireApproved publishes 221 exact GBIF owners from 226 represented source rows and holds 15 complex or non-exact rows. This dated publication scope is not a current site-suitability determination.
Ohio State University Extension Bulletin 921 is an Ohio publication that describes Ohio fire seasons and landscape conditions and labels nativity to Ohio. FireApproved publishes 352 exact source-owning plant records from its eight rated tables. This historical publication scope does not assert current extension endorsement or that a listed plant suits every Ohio site.
Virginia Cooperative Extension's publication opens with Virginia wildfire conditions, identifies its Virginia Firewise Landscaping Task Force, and labels plants native to Virginia. FireApproved publishes 306 exact source owners. Publication scope does not establish parcel suitability or current endorsement of this archived 2009 list.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Documented in CT, DC, DE, ID, IL, IN, KY, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MT, NC, NH, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PA, RI, TN, VA, VT, WA, WI, WV.
Native range
Introduced / established
30 sourced range or established records. This is not an invasive warning.
USDA hardiness
2 applicable cited hardiness statements overlap but have different boundaries; compare each complete source row.
3. Legal, ecological, and broader status
Legal-list status
5 legal-list records; the Place chip matches exact scope.
Seed-list status
Reported invasive here
1 ecological invasive report.
Broader regional context
Federal context
Plant-specific legal-list reviews (1)
These source-bound review receipts are separate from ecological invasive reports. A source or plant identity change invalidates a receipt.
NY · Regulated here. Designated regulated in the reviewed New York 6 NYCRR Part 575 Prohibited and Regulated Invasive Species as of 2026-08-26. Authority: New York State Department of Environmental Conservation; scope: state; as of 2026-08-26.Official reference.Normalized source record.
How to read this page
The status above is computed from the cited rows below: independent recommendations can support a fire-resistant result, an avoid row can produce keep-away, and disagreement stays visible as conflict. Placement notes preserve each source’s own scheme rather than translating unlike rules into one scale. This is evidence about a plant, not permission to plant it in every part of the defensible space; Zone 0 remains noncombustible.
Native and introduced range evidence
These are exact U.S. botanical-area records from the cited range source. Native and
introduced describe biogeographic relationship, not fire performance or planting approval.
Doubtful and extinct rows stay visible but do not count as current presence.
The lossless worldwide derivative is retained once in the research corpus; object pages repeat only exact U.S. areas needed by the local lens. The JSON twin carries the same page assertions.
Plant hardiness evidence
These values describe the plant source. Your ZIP zone comes from the separate 2023 USDA
Plant Hardiness Zone Map. Whole-zone values stay whole-zone, and a single unresolved value
is not treated as a tolerance range. Different source boundaries stay separate: overlapping
statements are compared independently, while only ranges with no shared zone are called a conflict.
Source prints 5 · single-value meaning unresolved · whole zone precision · source stated
Source taxon: Acer platanoides · exact match.
Source location: Cold Hardiness Zone field in the recovered selector record.
Not used for comparison: The recovered selector prints one Cold Hardiness Zone value but does not define it as a minimum threshold or a one-zone range.
Placement rules below use each source's own distances or named zones, tied to its rating.
They are not interchangeable with the directory's current Zone 0 guidance.
Eastern United States Fire Performance Plant Selector: Landscape Zone 3 — 10–30 ft from the structure; thin vegetation, remove debris, and minimize plant massing [Fire Performance Plant Selector landscape zone] (mid-scale rating)
Fire-Resistant Plants for Oregon Home Landscapes: Oregon [osu-frn6-oregon-regions] (with its recommendation)
Canberra Plant Selector: filtered result page 12 [canberra-selector] (with its recommendation)
The evidence
Grouped by what each source concluded. Primary evidence rated the plant itself
(a lab, field program, or original curation); corroboration compiled or
republished another source's rating and resolves to its root lineage.
“Fire-Resistant Plant Materials for Oregon”
· condition: green
Acer platanoides (Norway maple) is listed under “Trees—deciduous”. The guide says most listed plants require some irrigation during Oregon's dry summer months and must be maintained in a healthy condition.
FLAMITS record 2856; Combustibility measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying yes; device calorimeter; site Dibble2007-1; sampling ND. Primary study Dibble2007: Dibble, A. C., White, R. H., & Lebow, P. K. (2007). Combustion characteristics of north-eastern USA vegetation tested in the cone calorimeter: invasive versus non-invasive plants. International journal of wildland fire, 16, 426-443.
