Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.
Winter jasmine is generally rated fire resistant, although one eastern U.S.
selector rates it “Not Firewise.”
Five of six sources favor it. Virginia Tech gives winter jasmine the low band on its three-point flammability scale, while the University of Tennessee Extension lists it as a Firewise plant. The University of Exeter wildFIRE Lab places it in the green class, meaning low risk even during drought. The University of Arizona Extension calls it fire resistant when irrigated and maintained.
Against those findings, the USDA Forest Service Northeastern Area and state Firewise programs give winter jasmine a rating of 4, “Not Firewise,” the least favorable category on their four-level scale. The sources do not use one common standard: Virginia applies three flammability bands, Exeter uses laboratory-tested traffic-light classes, Arizona separates named resistant and fire-prone lists, and the eastern selector uses four Firewise ratings.
The weight of the findings supports calling winter jasmine fire resistant, but the support is limited and not unanimous. It is a shrub in the olive family that reaches about six feet at maturity. Arizona cautions that its fire-resistant plants are not fireproof and require irrigation and maintenance, while the eastern rating remains a clear warning against assuming winter jasmine will satisfy every Firewise program.
Form
shrub
Mature height
~6 ft
Light
Part sun
Rated in
Dorset, United Kingdom; Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia; Tennessee; Virginia / Mid-Atlantic +3
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
Dorset, United Kingdom; Maryland, New Jersey, and West Virginia; Tennessee; Virginia / Mid-Atlantic; Yavapai County, Arizona; eastern US; southern Idaho / Intermountain
Maintenance
Typed publication scope: 7 scopes across 5 cited fire sources
Southern Idaho (ID footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2013-11-08
The official database labels itself "For Southern Idaho" and describes Idaho residents at the urban-rangeland interface. FireApproved publishes 419 existing plant owners that cite its scored rows. This bounded Southern Idaho scope is regional context, not statewide coverage or a conclusion that the score transfers unchanged to every Idaho site.
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.
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.
Yavapai County (AZ footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2025-03-14
University of Arizona Cooperative Extension authors Bulletin 34 for Yavapai County. FireApproved publishes 198 exact source owners from its resistant and prone tables and keeps the county boundary visible. County publication scope is regional Arizona context, never statewide scope.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Documented in DC, DE, MD, NJ, OH, PA, WV.
Native range
Introduced / established
3 sourced range or established records. This is not an invasive warning.
USDA hardiness
Only uncertain or inapplicable hardiness rows are cited; no primary zone is projected.
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.
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.
Source prints 6 · single-value meaning unresolved · whole zone precision · source stated
Source taxon: Jasminum nudiflorum · 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.
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] (with its avoid rating)
Fire Resistance of Plants Master Database: plantable at 40' from home [Idaho minimum planting distance] (mid-scale rating)
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 as Winter jasmine — Jasminum nudiflorum. The bulletin says fire-resistant plants tend to resist ignition when irrigated and maintained, while fire-prone plants may ignite readily and burn intensely.
Listed as Jasminum nudiflorum (Winter Jasmine). The source says listed species exhibit stronger resistance to ignition by wildfires. Source comments: Drought tolerant, used in erosion control
