Home / Plants / Grow / Heteropogon contortus

Heteropogon contortus

Heteropogon contortus · Poaceae · all Heteropogon records

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: Mixed evidence — 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: 0 source placement records; source schemes remain separate.
Evidence regions: Global
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 AZ, CA, FL, HI, NM, PR, TX, VI.
Native range: Current cited native range in AZ, CA, FL, HI, NM, PR, TX.
Introduced / established: No introduced or established row is normalized; that does not prove native status.
USDA hardiness: Documented minimum 7b; no upper limit is documented.

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: 1 state noxious-weed seed record; set a location to match exact scope.
Reported invasive here: No ecological invasive report is normalized; that does not prove noninvasiveness.
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.

Form: grass
USDA hardiness: Minimum 7b; upper limit not documented
Mature height: ~0.7 ft
Water need: low
Current cited native range: AZ, CA, FL, HI, NM, PR, TX
Grows in: AZ, CA, FL, HI, NM, PR, TX, VI
Rated in: Global
Family: Poaceae
Evidence: 6 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

7

exact source areas

Current introduced

0

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

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

Arizona (AZ)
California (CA)
Florida (FL)
Hawaii (HI)
New Mexico (NM)
Puerto Rico (PR)
Texas (TX)

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.

USDA PLANTS Database — Plant Characteristics · record HECO10 · PLANTS Help Document 2022; characteristics cache retrieved 2026-08-23 · as of 2026-08-26

Minimum 7b · no upper limit documented · half zone precision · derived containing band

Exact source measurement: 7°F; mapped only to its containing half-zone.

Source taxon: Heteropogon contortus · source identifier match.

Source location: PlantCharacteristics record 23344, Temperature, Minimum (°F).

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.

Listed without a rating (6)

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

6 cited rows from this source; its identity, lineage and tier are stated once.
- “time to flaming (s): 1.93” · score 1.93 (FLAMITS — time to flaming (s))
  
  FLAMITS record 12788; Ignitability measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying no; device epiradiator; site Simpson2016-1; sampling july. Primary study Simpson2016: Simpson, K. J., Ripley, B. S., Christin, P. A., Belcher, C. M., Lehmann, C. E., Thomas, G. H., & Osborne, C P. (2016). Determinants of flammability in savanna grass species. Journal of Ecology, 104, 138-148.
- “time to flaming (s): 1.24” · score 1.24 (FLAMITS — time to flaming (s))
  
  FLAMITS record 12789; Ignitability measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying yes; device epiradiator; site Simpson2016-1; sampling july. Primary study Simpson2016: Simpson, K. J., Ripley, B. S., Christin, P. A., Belcher, C. M., Lehmann, C. E., Thomas, G. H., & Osborne, C P. (2016). Determinants of flammability in savanna grass species. Journal of Ecology, 104, 138-148.
- “mass loss rate (g/s): 0.04” · score 0.04 (FLAMITS — mass loss rate (g/s))
  
  FLAMITS record 12842; Combustibility measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying no; device epiradiator; site Simpson2016-1; sampling july. Primary study Simpson2016: Simpson, K. J., Ripley, B. S., Christin, P. A., Belcher, C. M., Lehmann, C. E., Thomas, G. H., & Osborne, C P. (2016). Determinants of flammability in savanna grass species. Journal of Ecology, 104, 138-148.
- “mass loss rate (g/s): 0.03” · score 0.03 (FLAMITS — mass loss rate (g/s))
  
  FLAMITS record 12843; Combustibility measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying yes; device epiradiator; site Simpson2016-1; sampling july. Primary study Simpson2016: Simpson, K. J., Ripley, B. S., Christin, P. A., Belcher, C. M., Lehmann, C. E., Thomas, G. H., & Osborne, C P. (2016). Determinants of flammability in savanna grass species. Journal of Ecology, 104, 138-148.
- “flaming duration (s): 4.73” · score 4.73 (FLAMITS — flaming duration (s))
  
  FLAMITS record 12890; Sustainability measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying no; device epiradiator; site Simpson2016-1; sampling july. Primary study Simpson2016: Simpson, K. J., Ripley, B. S., Christin, P. A., Belcher, C. M., Lehmann, C. E., Thomas, G. H., & Osborne, C P. (2016). Determinants of flammability in savanna grass species. Journal of Ecology, 104, 138-148.
- “flaming duration (s): 5.1” · score 5.1 (FLAMITS — flaming duration (s))
  
  FLAMITS record 12891; Sustainability measurement; plant part leaves; fuel live; predrying yes; device epiradiator; site Simpson2016-1; sampling july. Primary study Simpson2016: Simpson, K. J., Ripley, B. S., Christin, P. A., Belcher, C. M., Lehmann, C. E., Thomas, G. H., & Osborne, C P. (2016). Determinants of flammability in savanna grass species. Journal of Ecology, 104, 138-148.

Fire-resistant grasss instead

Fescue, Tall
Festuca arundinacea

Tall fescue
Lolium arundinaceum

Blue Grama
Bouteloua gracilis

Fox sedge
Carex vulpinoidea

Western Wheatgrass
Agropyron smithii

Sugar cane
Saccharum officinarum

Last verified 2026-08-25. JSON (CC BY 4.0)

Profiles: USDA PLANTS · GBIF ·

Heteropogon contortus (Heteropogon contortus). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/heteropogon-contortus/. Last verified 2026-08-25.