Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.
Hypericum calycinum cites Fire-Retardant Plants for Brush Fire Prevention. Then 1 ecological invasive reports on Hypericum calycinum. The citations do not collapse — Hypericum calycinum. On hypericum calycinum, Fire Retardant Plants for Brush Fire Prevention in Hillside Residential Areas does not replace 1 ecological invasive reports.
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.
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.
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.
University of Tennessee Extension SP685 is Tennessee landscape guidance and publishes 78 represented plant owners. Most table rows are a carrier of Virginia Firescapes rather than an independent rating; Tennessee source scope does not change that lineage or establish site suitability.
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 CA, OH, OR, TN, WA.
Native range
Introduced / established
1 sourced range or established record. This is not an invasive warning.
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 2b; no upper limit is documented.
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.
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.
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.
Fire-Retardant Plants for Brush Fire Prevention in Hillsi…: Category 4 [la-arboretum-1970-leaf-moisture-fire-retardance] (with its recommendation)
Defensible Space Landscaping in the Urban/Wildland Interf…: Chapter 4, Landscape Vegetation Database [ucfpl-1997] (mid-scale rating)
Firewise Landscaping Plants: Ground Covers; Herbaceous Annuals and Perennials [Maryland Firewise plant-form tables] (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.
Low Flammability Plants directory — Fire and Emergency New Zealand (plant flammability testing at Lincoln University) · 2026 · original sourcePrimary evidenceLab-testedlineage: lincoln-nz-tree
“CATEGORY 4 — LEAST FIRE RETARDANCE Plants with medium leaf moisture content capacity (60-70%)”
· condition: green
Hypericum calycinum (Aaron's Beard) is one of 30 low-growing plants in the source's recommended Table 1. The category reflects leaf moisture capacity under normal garden conditions at the Arboretum.
Listed as Hypericum calycinum (St Johnswort); Hypericum calycinum (St Johnswort). The source says listed species exhibit stronger resistance to ignition by wildfires. Source comments: Used in erosion control. Poisonous
