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Holly osmanthus has conflicting fire-resistance guidance.
Its recommendation for gardens in Catalonia sits alongside a high-flammability rating from Virginia, so the regional source matters when choosing this shrub.
Virginia Cooperative Extension assigns Osmanthus heterophyllus an H, meaning high flammability. The accompanying comment says it tolerates a wide range of conditions in warm climates. Growing successfully under those conditions does not change the fire rating printed beside its name.
Girona's pirogardening guide recommends the species for gardens at the wildland-urban interface. Its profile describes sun or partial shade, moderate watering and well-drained soil that retains moisture. The recommendation belongs to a garden-suitability method that assumes care appropriate to the species; it combines fire evidence with maintenance and other planting considerations.
The Japanese classification reproduced by Kagoshima Prefecture places holly osmanthus in the medium fire-protection-power class. That describes a different property from Virginia's flammability grade and does not settle the disagreement between the regional planting recommendations.
For a site where Virginia's guidance applies, the high-flammability finding remains a reason to choose another shrub. Girona provides a favorable recommendation with growing conditions attached. Choosing between those recommendations calls for their local context, rather than treating successful cultivation or a medium protection class as proof of low flammability.
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 VA.
Native range
Introduced / established
2 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 location: PlantCharacteristics record 49875, Temperature, Minimum (°F).
Not used for comparison: USDA PLANTS provides no duration for this record, so perennial hardiness applicability is unresolved.
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.
Guía de pirojardinería: suitable inside or outside the 25-metre maximum-risk zone [girona-2020-iuf-25m-suitability] (with its recommendation)
Tree fire-protection classification in Hito to Shinrin: ヒイラギ — Table 10-2 [tadaki-kira-1982-fire-protection-power] (mid-scale rating)
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.
Osmanthus heterophyllus is rated “RECOMENDADA” by the guide's qualitative IUF garden-suitability method. The method assumes species-specific care and integrates fire evidence with fuel structure, maintenance, origin, invasiveness, and expert fire-service experience.
Tolerates a wide range of conditions in warm climates.
Mid-scale / conditional (1)
Tree fire-protection classification in Hito to Shinrin (人と森林) — Kyoritsu Shuppan; table reproduced by Kagoshima Prefecture · Hito to Shinrin (1982), Table 10-2; Kagoshima web reproduction · original sourcePrimary evidenceExpert-curatedlineage: independent (root of Japanese municipal fire-protection tree lists)
Table 10-2 prints ヒイラギ in the medium fire-protection-power class. The Kagoshima reproduction says highly fire-protective trees can slow spread, promote upward dispersal of heat and smoke, and intercept flying embers.
