FireApproved

United States / Grow / white ash

white ash (Fraxinus americana)
Photo: (c) Zihao Wang, some rights reserved (CC BY) (CC BY), via iNaturalist. Species-typical, not necessarily this cultivar.

white ash

Fraxinus americana · Oleaceae · all Fraxinus records · Wikipedia

View Saved

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, white ash is rated fire resistant across programs in the eastern United States, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia, and British Columbia.

The USDA Forest Service and state Firewise programs assign it Firewise 1, the most favorable point on their four-step scale. North Carolina’s extension service rates it low in both its 2005 four-tier system and its 2025 three-category successor. Ohio State University Extension gives it L, which supports recommendation on its five-band scale, while Virginia Cooperative Extension gives it L, the lowest flammability rating on its three-point scale. FireSmart BC also approves it as fire resistant, although it flags the plant as needing more research.

The agreement carries weight because these organizations use different systems. The Forest Service selector is a keyed curation, FireSmart BC compiles approved plants, and the state extension services provide expert-curated ratings. Despite those differences, none reaches a contrary conclusion about white ash flammability.

White ash is a full-sun tree in the olive family that reaches about 100 feet at maturity and has high water needs. Ohio State describes it as drought sensitive and heat tolerant and warns that it can fail without warning, while Virginia Tech reports good heat and drought resistance. That disagreement concerns environmental tolerance, not flammability; both assign an L fire rating. The Forest Service guidance also warns that emerald ash borer is destroying native ash in infected areas and that ash firewood is quarantined. White ash therefore has solid support as a low-flammability tree, but its health and restrictions on moving firewood remain separate concerns.

Form
tree
Mature height
~100 ft
Light
Full sun
Water need
high
Rated in
British Columbia; Global; Maine; Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia +6
On this lot

1. Fire evidence and conditions

Fire evidence
Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
Placement evidence
4 source placement records; source schemes remain separate.
Evidence regions
British Columbia; Global; Maine; Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia; NC; North Carolina; North Carolina / southeastern US; Ohio / Midwest; Virginia / Mid-Atlantic; eastern US
Typed publication scope: 7 scopes across 5 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.

  • 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, CO, CT, DC, DE, FL, GA, HI, 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, 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.
Introduced / established
2 sourced range or established records. This is not an invasive warning.
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 3b; no upper limit is documented.

3. Legal, ecological, and broader status

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

36

exact source areas

Current introduced

2

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

36 native source areas · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04
  • Alabama (AL)
  • Arkansas (AR)
  • Connecticut (CT)
  • District of Columbia (DC)
  • Delaware (DE)
  • Florida (FL)
  • Georgia (GA)
  • Iowa (IA)
  • Illinois (IL)
  • Indiana (IN)
  • Kansas (KS)
  • Kentucky (KY)
  • Louisiana (LA)
  • Massachusetts (MA)
  • Maryland (MD)
  • Maine (ME)
  • Michigan (MI)
  • Minnesota (MN)
  • Missouri (MO)
  • Mississippi (MS)
  • North Carolina (NC)
  • Nebraska (NE)
  • New Hampshire (NH)
  • New Jersey (NJ)
  • New York (NY)
  • Ohio (OH)
  • Oklahoma (OK)
  • Pennsylvania (PA)
  • Rhode I. (RI)
  • South Carolina (SC)
  • Tennessee (TN)
  • Texas (TX)
  • Virginia (VA)
  • Vermont (VT)
  • Wisconsin (WI)
  • West Virginia (WV)
2 introduced source areas · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04
  • Colorado (CO)
  • Hawaii (HI)

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 (9)

Corroboration (4 rows from 4 sources)
Listed without a rating (12)
Corroboration (12 rows from 1 source)

  • FLAMITS: FLAMmability plant traiTS database — Dryad / Global Ecology and Biogeography · Dryad version 9 · original source Corroboration Trait database lineage: meta-aggregator

    12 cited rows from this source; its identity, lineage and tier are stated once.

    • Primary study Shi2013: Shi, L., & Chew, M. Y. L. (2013). Experimental study of woods under external heat flux by autoignition. Journal of thermal analysis and calorimetry, 111, 1399-1407.

      Shared row context: Ignitability measurement; plant part wood; fuel dead; predrying yes; device calorimeter; site Shi2013-1; sampling ND.

      • “time to flaming (s): 59”

        FLAMITS record 12639.

      • “time to flaming (s): 57”

        FLAMITS record 12645.

      • “time to flaming (s): 23”

        FLAMITS record 12651.

      • “time to flaming (s): 21”

        FLAMITS record 12657.

      • “time to flaming (s): 19”

        FLAMITS record 12663.

      • “time to flaming (s): 13”

        FLAMITS record 12669.

      • “temperature at flaming (°C): 393”

        FLAMITS record 12675.

      • “temperature at flaming (°C): 487.6”

        FLAMITS record 12681.

      • “temperature at flaming (°C): 346”

        FLAMITS record 12687.

      • “temperature at flaming (°C): 291.7”

        FLAMITS record 12693.

      • “temperature at flaming (°C): 340.9”

        FLAMITS record 12699.

      • “temperature at flaming (°C): 264.4”

        FLAMITS record 12705.

Same genus in the directory · the Fraxinus group page

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

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

Fraxinus americana (White ash). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/fraxinus-americana/. Last verified 2026-08-23.