United States / Grow / common buttonbush

common buttonbush

Cephalanthus occidentalis · Rubiaceae · also called Buttonbush · Wikipedia

Is this one for your yard?

Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.

Yes, common buttonbush is rated fire resistant.

Across six published assessments, extension sources in North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia, and Oregon all place it on the favorable side of their systems. North Carolina’s guides call it low in flammability. Ohio State gives it L on a five-band scale, where L supports recommendation, while Virginia Tech gives it L on a three-band scale with the same practical meaning. Oregon State includes it among fire-resistant plants suited to Willamette Valley growing conditions.

The agreement matters because these sources use different regional guides and rating systems yet reach the same conclusion. The North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia ratings are expert judgments comparing many landscape plants. Oregon uses a simpler yes-or-no approach, profiling plants it recommends as fire resistant. Taken together, the published findings offer unusually consistent support rather than a verdict resting on one local list.

Common buttonbush is a high-water shrub in the Rubiaceae family, reaching about 12 feet at maturity in full sun. Both Ohio State and Virginia Tech describe it as well suited to wet soils while rating it L. It is native across much of the United States and hardy to USDA zone 5a. For a homeowner choosing among landscape shrubs, its low-flammability ratings are clear and repeated across several regions.

Form: shrub
Mature height: ~12 ft
Light: Full sun
Water need: high
Rated in: Maine; Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia; NC; North Carolina +5

On this lot

1. Fire evidence and conditions

Fire evidence: Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
Fire-performance conditions
Fire ecology context
Placement evidence: 5 source placement records; source schemes remain separate.
Evidence regions: Maine; Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia; NC; North Carolina; North Carolina / southeastern US; Ohio / Midwest; Oregon (Willamette Valley); Virginia / Mid-Atlantic; eastern US
Maintenance

Typed publication scope: 8 scopes across 6 cited fire sources

Firewise Landscaping Plants (Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia editions) · Official scoped edition
- MD; partial normalized coverage · 2015-01-08
  Maryland Forest Service says the list contains plants that can be grown in Maryland and identifies Maryland natives. FireApproved publishes 169 exact source owners from the 180 printed rows; an unrepresentable form and duplicate-owner rows are not broadened. The list calls itself non-comprehensive and does not establish suitability for every Maryland site.
- NJ; partial normalized coverage
  New Jersey DEP publishes a state edition saying the listed plants can be grown in New Jersey and are relatively resistant to fire. Its same 180 printed taxon occurrences map to the 169 conservative owners already normalized for the template family. The list is non-comprehensive and does not establish suitability for every New Jersey site or override the Pinelands Commission's separate placement and fuel-break rules.
- WV; partial normalized coverage · 2026-08-26
  West Virginia Division of Forestry publishes a state edition saying the listed plants can be grown in West Virginia and are relatively resistant to fire. Its same 180 printed taxon occurrences map to the 169 conservative owners already normalized for the template family. The list is non-comprehensive and provides no comparative or site-specific rating.
Maine fire-resistant plant list · Official scoped edition
- ME; partial normalized coverage · 2013-10-23
  Maine Forest Service presents a partial list for landscaping 30-100 feet from a structure. FireApproved publishes only 39 unique exact current/accepted matches plus Rhus typhina from the source's explicit parenthetical; unresolved, abbreviated, misspelled, absent, and duplicate-owner rows remain held.
Fire-Resistant Landscaping in North Carolina (AG-874) · Official scoped edition
- NC; complete normalized coverage · 2025-03-26
  The complete three-table AG-874 plant list is explicitly for North Carolina and contains 202 low-, medium-, or high-flammability rows. FireApproved accounts for all source rows under its strict taxonomy and lineage rules; source scope does not establish local suitability at a particular North Carolina site.
Firewise Landscaping (OSU Extension Bulletin 921) · Official scoped edition
- OH; partial normalized coverage · 2006-03-01
  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.
Fire-resistant Landscape Plants for the Willamette Valley (EM 9103) · Official scoped edition
- Willamette Valley (OR footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2015-02-01
  OSU Extension says EM 9103 highlights fire-resistant plants that thrive under Willamette Valley growing conditions. FireApproved publishes 172 exact owners only as valley context. The guide shares the PNW 590 lineage and is not a second independent vote or statewide site clearance.
Virginia Firescapes — Firewise Landscaping for Woodland Homes (430-300) · Official scoped edition
- VA; partial normalized coverage · 2009-04-15
  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 AL, AR, AZ, CA, CT, DC, DE, FL, GA, IA, IL, IN, KS, KY, LA, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MS, NC, NE, NH, NJ, NY, OH, OK, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, VA, VT, WI, WV.
Native range: Current cited native range in AL, AR, AZ, CA, CT, FL, GA, IL, IN, KY, LA, MA, MD, ME, MN, MO, NC, NE, NH, NJ, NM, NY, OK, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, UT, VA, VT, WI.
Introduced / established
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
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.

Current native

32

exact source areas

Current introduced

0

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

32 native source areas · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04

Alabama (AL)
Arkansas (AR)
Arizona (AZ)
California (CA)
Connecticut (CT)
Florida (FL)
Georgia (GA)
Illinois (IL)
Indiana (IN)
Kentucky (KY)
Louisiana (LA)
Massachusetts (MA)
Maryland (MD)
Maine (ME)
Minnesota (MN)
Missouri (MO)
North Carolina (NC)
Nebraska (NE)
New Hampshire (NH)
New Jersey (NJ)
New Mexico (NM)
New York (NY)
Oklahoma (OK)
Pennsylvania (PA)
Rhode I. (RI)
South Carolina (SC)
Tennessee (TN)
Texas (TX)
Utah (UT)
Virginia (VA)
Vermont (VT)
Wisconsin (WI)

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.

Eastern United States Fire Performance Plant Selector · record cephalanthus-occidentalis · 2016-wayback · as of 2026-08-26

Source prints 5 · single-value meaning unresolved · whole zone precision · source stated

Source taxon: Cephalanthus occidentalis · 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.
Fire-resistant Landscape Plants for the Willamette Valley (EM 9103) · EM 9103, February 2015 · as of 2026-08-26

5–9 explicit range · whole zone precision · source stated

Source taxon: Cephalanthus occidentalis · exact match.

Source location: Buttonbush profile (PDF page 117).
USDA PLANTS Database — Plant Characteristics · record CEOC2 · PLANTS Help Document 2022; characteristics cache retrieved 2026-08-23 · as of 2026-08-26

Minimum 3b · no upper limit documented · half zone precision · derived containing band

Exact source measurement: -33°F; mapped only to its containing half-zone.

Source taxon: Cephalanthus occidentalis · source identifier match.

Source location: PlantCharacteristics record 47594, Temperature, Minimum (°F).

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.

Eastern United States Fire Performance Plant Selector: Landscape Zone 2 — 5–10 ft from the structure; maintained lawn or fuel breaks, with easily ignited evergreens avoided [Fire Performance Plant Selector landscape zone] (mid-scale rating)
Fire-resistant Landscape Plants for the Willamette Valley: Buttonbush profile (PDF page 117) [osu-em-9103-profile] (with its recommendation)
North Carolina Extension Gardener Plant Toolbox: cephalanthus-occidentalis [nc-toolbox-flammability-facet] (with its recommendation)
Firewise Landscaping Plants: Deciduous Shrubs [Maryland Firewise plant-form tables] (with its recommendation)
Maine fire-resistant plant list: Shrubs, page 1: Buttonbush - Cephalanthus occidentalis [Maine Forest Service list section and page] (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.

Mid-scale / conditional (1)

Eastern United States Fire Performance Plant Selector — USDA Forest Service Northeastern Area S&PF + state Firewise programs (WV, OH, PA, DE, DC, MD, NJ) · 2016-wayback · original source Primary evidence Keyed curation lineage: ufifas-srs-tree

“MODERATELY Firewise (2)”

Unusual white feathery ball shaped flowers. Native wetland shrub.

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

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

Cephalanthus occidentalis (Buttonbush). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/cephalanthus-occidentalis/. Last verified 2026-08-23.