United States / Grow / water tupelo

water tupelo (Nyssa aquatica)
Photo: no rights reserved (CC0), via iNaturalist. Species-typical, not necessarily this cultivar.

water tupelo

Nyssa aquatica · Nyssaceae · all Nyssa records · Wikipedia

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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.

On nyssa aquatica, Nyssa aquatica shows on list recommendation. Nyssa aquatica then and limited evidence for aquatica. The banner is not the whole file on nyssa aquatica. Nyssa aquatica keeps on list with limited evidence for aquatica.

On nyssa aquatica, Nyssa aquatica also carries 2 hardiness rows for aquatica.

Use evidence on nyssa aquatica for aquatica. Use hardiness on nyssa aquatica for aquatica. Nyssa aquatica keeps the sourced table for aquatica.

Form
tree
Mature height
~50 ft
Light
Full sun
Water need
high
Rated in
eastern US
On this lot

1. Fire evidence and conditions

Fire evidence
Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
Placement evidence
1 source placement record; source schemes remain separate.
Evidence regions
eastern US

2. Why this plant is relevant here

State distribution
Documented in AL, AR, DC, DE, FL, GA, IL, KY, LA, MD, MO, MS, NC, NJ, OH, PA, SC, TN, TX, VA, WV.
Native range
Current cited native range in AL, AR, DC, FL, GA, IL, KY, LA, MO, MS, NC, SC, TN, TX, VA.
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 4b; 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

15

exact source areas

Current introduced

0

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

15 native source areas · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04
  • Alabama (AL)
  • Arkansas (AR)
  • District of Columbia (DC)
  • Florida (FL)
  • Georgia (GA)
  • Illinois (IL)
  • Kentucky (KY)
  • Louisiana (LA)
  • Missouri (MO)
  • Mississippi (MS)
  • North Carolina (NC)
  • South Carolina (SC)
  • Tennessee (TN)
  • Texas (TX)
  • Virginia (VA)

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 (1)

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

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

Nyssa aquatica (Water tupelo). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/nyssa-aquatica/. Last verified 2026-08-23.