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African lily has favorable fire-performance ratings, but the sources do not establish a firm fire-resistant verdict.
The University of California Forest Products Laboratory reported that Dietes bicolor was recommended by multiple references for high-fire-risk areas. The Sun City Texas Firewise Group rated it low for flammability hazard, meaning a low tendency to burn at high temperatures for a prolonged time. The Diablo Firesafe Council also placed the shrub among plants receiving favorable ratings from multiple references.
The agreement is encouraging, but the strength of those ratings has limits. The University of California report cautions that many of the plant lists it compiled used undefined terms and often lacked a scientific basis. Those limitations make the favorable labels difficult to combine into a single, calibrated judgment.
African lily, a shrub in the iris family, is therefore a promising choice rather than a proven fire-resistant plant. Its published assessments consistently lean favorable, but they support a cautious conclusion: it may present relatively low flammability under the cited guidance, while the broader claim that it is fire resistant remains unsettled.
Form
shrub
Rated in
California; Georgetown, Texas
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Mixed evidence — location does not change the cited classification.
The guide presents itself as fire performance ratings for common landscape plants in a fire-prone California setting. FireApproved publishes 104 exact owners as republished California context. It is not an independent rating, a current endorsement, or parcel suitability.
The UC Forest Products Laboratory says the guide covers properties of common California landscaping plants and was prepared for California fire agencies. FireApproved publishes 130 exact owners at historical California publication scope. The report is a 1997 compilation, not a current endorsement, site rating, or independent test of every row.
Sun City Texas, Georgetown (TX footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2015-01-14
The guide is authored for the Sun City Texas community in Georgetown. FireApproved publishes 142 exact owners only as community-level context. It is an archived HOA exhibit with unknown rating lineage, not a current statewide Texas source or an independent Tier 1 determination.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Native range
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.
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.
Defensible Space Landscaping in the Urban/Wildland Interf…: Chapter 4, Landscape Vegetation Database [ucfpl-1997] (with its recommendation)
Firewise Plant Guide: Perennials [Sun City plant-table sections] (with its recommendation)
Fire Performance of Common Plants: Table 1 (favorable in 3 or more references) [diablo-guide-to-plants-three-reference-vote] (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.
The table rates Iris, Bicolor (African) — Dietes bicolor low for flammability hazard, defined as the ease a plant can burn at high temperatures for a prolonged time.
Fire Performance of Common Plants (Guide to Plants) — Diablo Firesafe Council · live page captured 2026-08-29 · original sourceCorroborationMirrorlineage: ucfpl-berkeley resolves to Defensible Space Landscaping in the Urban/Wildland Interface: A Compilation of Fire Performance Ratings of Residential Landscape Plants
“Table 1: favorable fire performance rating in 3 or more references (refs 9,25,40,41)”
The Diablo Firesafe Council Guide to Plants lists Dietes bicolor (Wild yellow iris, African iris) as shrub, evergreen, in Table 1: plants with a favorable fire performance rating in 3 or more references. The guide cites 4 of its 57 numbered references for this row (9,25,40,41). The guide states the ranking terms in its underlying references were mostly undefined and makes no attempt to rank within the list, and that fire performance is compromised without maintenance.
