Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.
Coville’s serviceberry is a Firewise choice in three regional guides, but New Mexico limits that recommendation by elevation.
The University of Arizona’s extension service lists the shrub as fire-resistant plant material for sites above 3,000 feet. Fremont County Firewise also includes Amelanchier utahensis, under the name Utah serviceberry, among large shrubs and trees. That source describes its Firewise plants generally as relatively moist, low-debris choices, though it does not give the species a comparative rating.
New Mexico’s Forestry Division provides the most qualified guidance. It recommends the plant at 5,000, 6,000, and 7,000 feet; marks its suitability unknown or doubtful at 4,000 and 8,000 feet; and does not recommend it at 9,000 feet or higher. Its listing also describes a mature height of 5 to 10 feet and very low to medium water needs.
These are compiled planting recommendations, so they support choosing Coville’s serviceberry for suitable regional conditions rather than proving a universal level of fire resistance. For a property between 5,000 and 7,000 feet in the interior Southwest, the guidance is consistently favorable. Outside that band, especially above 9,000 feet, the New Mexico limits make a blanket “fire resistant” label too broad.
Form
shrub
Rated in
Arizona above 3,000 feet / interior Southwest; Fremont County, Wyoming; New Mexico
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Mixed evidence — location does not change the cited classification.
Fremont County (WY footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2011-02-25
The source identifies itself as the Fremont County Firewise Plant List. FireApproved publishes its 92 exact source owners as Fremont County regional context. No methodology, current county endorsement, statewide Wyoming scope, or site-specific suitability is inferred.
New Mexico Forestry Division publishes this as its FireWise Plant List for New Mexico. FireApproved accounts for all 140 printed rows and publishes 95 exact same-rank owners already represented in the directory; 29 exact taxa without an existing record, 14 unresolved spellings or higher-rank matches, one compound taxon cell, and one species row whose only apparent owner has an infraspecific printed identity remain held. Every published row retains the source's Y, N, ?, or blank elevation cells. Publication scope does not erase those elevation limits or establish suitability for every New Mexico site.
Arizona at or above 3,000 feet (AZ footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2011-12-01
AZ1289 is explicitly limited to Arizona elevations of 3,000 feet and higher. FireApproved publishes 69 exact owners as regional Arizona context, retaining every water and elevation condition. It is never promoted to statewide low-desert guidance or an independent Tier 1 vote.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Documented in AZ, CA, NV, UT.
Native range
Current cited native range in AZ, CA, CO, ID, MT, NM, NV, OR, TX, UT, WA, WY.
Introduced / established
USDA hardiness
3. Legal, ecological, and broader status
Legal-list status
Seed-list status
Reported invasive here
Broader regional context
Federal context
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.
Where its sources say to plant it
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.
FireWise Plant List for New Mexico: PDF page 3, Trees and Large Shrubs, p3-r06 [nm-emnrd-firewise-table-row] (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.
“Fremont County Firewise Plant List — Amelanchier utahensis — Utah Serviceberry”
Listed in the source's Large Shrubs and Trees section; the page describes its listed Firewise plants as generally low-growing, low-debris, and relatively moist.
FireWise Plant List for New Mexico — New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department, Forestry Division · 2003 Forestry Division PDF · original sourceCorroborationCompilationlineage: csu-nmsu-firewise
“FireWise Plant List for New Mexico”
Listed as Amelanchier utahensis (Utah serviceberry) in Trees and Large Shrubs. Printed elevation cells: 4,000 ft=?, 5,000 ft=Y, 6,000 ft=Y, 7,000 ft=Y, 8,000 ft=?, 9,000+ ft=N. Water need: VL-M; sun/shade: S; mature height: 5-10’; approximate bloom: May.
