United States / Grow / Coulter pine

Coulter pine (Pinus coulteri)
Photo: (c) Henrik Kibak, some rights reserved (CC BY) (CC BY), via iNaturalist. Species-typical, not necessarily this cultivar.

Coulter pine

Pinus coulteri · Pinaceae · all Pinus records · Wikipedia

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Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.

Form
tree
Mature height
~80 ft
Water need
moderate
Rated in
Global; New Zealand
Uses
ornamental
On this lot

1. Fire evidence and conditions

Fire evidence
Mixed evidence — location does not change the cited classification.
Evidence regions
Global; New Zealand

2. Why this plant is relevant here

State distribution
Documented in CA.
Native range
Current cited native range in CA.
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 8a; 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

1

exact source area

Current introduced

0

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

1 native source area · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04
  • California (CA)

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.

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.

Mid-scale / conditional (1)

Listed without a rating (11)
Corroboration (11 rows from 1 source)
  • FLAMITS: FLAMmability plant traiTS database — Dryad / Global Ecology and Biogeography · Dryad version 9 · original source Corroboration Trait database lineage: meta-aggregator

    11 cited rows from this source; its identity, lineage and tier are stated once.

    • Primary study Cui2020a: Cui, X., Paterson, A. M., Wyse, S. V., Alam, M. A., Maurin, K. J. L., Pieper, R., ... Curran, T. J. (2020a). Shoot flammability of vascular plants is phylogenetically conserved and related to habitat fire-proneness and growth form. Nature Plants, 6, 355-359.

      Shared row context: plant part branches; fuel all; predrying yes; device grill; site Cui2020a-1; sampling ND.

      • “ignition frequency (%): 75”

        FLAMITS record 1457; Ignitability measurement.

      • “maximum sample temperature (°C): 552”

        FLAMITS record 1651; Combustibility measurement.

      • “burning duration (s): 80.8”

        FLAMITS record 1845; Sustainability measurement.

      • “estimated burnt biomass (%): 22.5”

        FLAMITS record 2039; Consumability measurement.

    • Primary study Hachmi2011: Hachmi, M. H., Sesbou, A., Benjelloun, H., El Handouz, N., & Bouanane, F. (2011). A Simple Technique to Estimate the Flammability Index of Moroccan Forest Fuels. Journal of Combustion, 2011, 1-11.

      Shared row context: plant part twigs; fuel live; predrying no; device epiradiator; site Hachmi2011-1; sampling ND.

      • “time to flaming (s): 7.2”

        FLAMITS record 4717; Ignitability measurement.

      • “flame height (cm): 14”

        FLAMITS record 4769; Combustibility measurement.

      • “burning duration (s): 14.1”

        FLAMITS record 4770; Sustainability measurement.

    • Primary study Varner2022: Varner, J. M., Shearman, T. M., Kane, J. M., Banwell, E., Jules, E., & Stambaugh, M. (2022). Understanding flammability and bark thickness in the genus Pinus using a phylogenetic approach. Scientific Reports, 12, 7384.

      Shared row context: plant part litter; fuel all; predrying yes; device burning bench; site Varner2022-9; sampling ND.

      • “flame height (cm): 67.7”

        FLAMITS record 15677; Combustibility measurement.

      • Shared measurement context: Sustainability measurement.

        • “flaming duration (s): 82.4”

          FLAMITS record 15678.

        • “smouldering duration (s): 328.6”

          FLAMITS record 15679.

      • “burnt biomass (%): 92”

        FLAMITS record 15680; Consumability measurement.

Fire-resistant trees instead

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

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Pinus coulteri (Coulter pine). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/pinus-coulteri/. Last verified 2026-08-23.