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Heather

Calluna vulgaris · Ericaceae

Your local evidence lens

Separate evidence questions, never one approval badge

Set a ZIP to compare this record with state distribution, native range, USDA hardiness, and invasive records.

A genus split is not a placement verdict. Set a ZIP to read the local documented split.

1. Fire evidence and conditions

Fire evidence
Highly flammable — location does not change the cited classification.
Fire-performance conditions
No test or rating condition is normalized.
Fire ecology context
No section-reviewed fire-ecology context is normalized.
Placement evidence
2 source placement records; source schemes remain separate.
Evidence regions
British Columbia; Catalonia, Spain; Global; Mediterranean France / Provence; eastern US
Maintenance
No sourced horticultural maintenance assertion is normalized; fire-test conditions do not supply maintenance advice.

2. Why this plant is relevant here

State distribution
Documented in CT, DC, DE, MA, MD, ME, MI, NH, NJ, NY, OH, PA, RI, VT, WA, WI, WV.
Native range
No current cited or legacy state native range is normalized.
Introduced / established
11 sourced range or established records; set a location to match them. This is not an invasive warning.
USDA hardiness
Only uncertain or inapplicable hardiness rows are cited; no primary zone is projected.

3. Legal, ecological, and broader status

Legal-list status
Set a location for an exact legal-list result; source silence is not clearance.
Seed-list status
Set a location to compare the separate state noxious-weed seed layer.
Reported invasive here
1 ecological invasive report; set a location to distinguish exact from regional context.
Broader regional context
Aggregate AK, HI, and L48 evidence is shown only as regional context, never as an exact-state finding.
Federal context
Federal designations remain separate from state legal-list results.
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.

Heather (Calluna vulgaris)
Photo: (c) zebedeugalinha, some rights reserved (CC BY) (CC BY), via iNaturalist. Species-typical, not necessarily this cultivar.
Form
shrub
USDA hardiness
Only uncertain or inapplicable source rows; no primary zone projected
Mature height
~2 ft
Light
Full sun
Grows in
CT, DC, DE, MA, MD, ME, MI, NH +9
Rated in
British Columbia; Catalonia, Spain; Global; Mediterranean France / Provence +1
Family
Ericaceae
Evidence
24 cited sources

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.

Current native

0

exact source areas

Current introduced

11

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

11 introduced source areas · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04
  • Connecticut (CT)
  • Massachusetts (MA)
  • Michigan (MI)
  • North Carolina (NC)
  • New Jersey (NJ)
  • New York (NY)
  • Oregon (OR)
  • Rhode I. (RI)
  • Vermont (VT)
  • Wisconsin (WI)
  • West Virginia (WV)

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.

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.

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.

Recommends (1)

Avoids (2)

Mid-scale / conditional (1)

Listed without a rating (20)

Fire-resistant shrubs instead

Snowberry
Symphoricarpos albus High bush blueberry
Vaccinium corymbosum Black chokeberry
Aronia melanocarpa Dwarf Blue Arctic Willow
Salix purpurea Northern elderberry
Sambucus pubens Kinnikinnick
Arctostaphylos uva-ursi

Fire-resistant shrubs listed above

Same genus in the directory
  • Heather (Calluna sp. — documented conflict)

Last verified 2026-08-23. JSON (CC BY 4.0)

Profiles: USDA PLANTS · GBIF · iNaturalist · Wikidata · ITIS

Calluna vulgaris (Heather). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/calluna-vulgaris/. Last verified 2026-08-23.