United States / Grow / western white pine

western white pine

Pinus monticola · Pinaceae · all Pinus records · also called Pine, western white · 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
~200 ft
Water need
moderate
Rated in
Global; Lake Tahoe Basin, Nevada and California
On this lot

1. Fire evidence and conditions

Fire evidence
Mixed evidence — location does not change the cited classification.
Placement evidence
1 source placement record; source schemes remain separate.
Evidence regions
Global; Lake Tahoe Basin, Nevada and California
Typed publication scope: 1 scope across 1 cited fire source

2. Why this plant is relevant here

State distribution
Documented in CA, ID, MT, NV, OR, UT, WA.
Native range
Current cited native range in CA, ID, MT, NV, OR, WA.
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 3b; 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

6

exact source areas

Current introduced

0

exact source areas

Qualified

0

doubtful or extinct source rows

6 native source areas · World Checklist of Vascular Plants, version 16 v16, as of 2026-06-04
  • California (CA)
  • Idaho (ID)
  • Montana (MT)
  • Nevada (NV)
  • Oregon (OR)
  • Washington (WA)

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.

Avoids (1)

Corroboration (1 rows from 1 source)
  • Home Landscaping Guide for Lake Tahoe and Vicinity (Ed. Bulletin 06-01) — Nevada Division of Forestry / University of Nevada Cooperative Extension · Bulletin 06-01 (2006) · original source Corroboration Compilation lineage: unr-tree

    “high — Pine, western white — Pinus monticola”

    Table 1's Fire Hazard column prints “high” for this taxon. The guide calls the rating a rough estimate of potential flammability, not a result of scientific trials. Its footnote says plants that turn brown often become high fire hazards and tells readers to mow grasses and forbs when they begin to turn brown.

Listed without a rating (15)
Corroboration (15 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

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

    • Primary study Kelsey1979: Kelsey, R. G., Shafizadeh, F., & Lowery, D. P. (1979). Heat content of bark, twigs, and foliage of nine species of western conifers. United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Research Paper INT-261. Intermountain Forest and Range Experiment Station, Ogden, Utah.

      Shared row context: Combustibility measurement; fuel all; predrying yes; device calorimeter; site Kelsey1979-1; sampling ND.

      • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5197.28”

        FLAMITS record 5664; plant part bark.

      • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5271.32”

        FLAMITS record 5665; plant part twigs.

      • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5022.92”

        FLAMITS record 5666; plant part leaves.

    • Primary study vanWagtendonk1998: Van Wagdendonk, J., Sydoriak, W. M., & Benedict, J. M. (1998). Heat content variation of Sierra Nevada conifers. International Journal of Wildland Fire, 8, 147-158.

      Shared row context: Combustibility measurement; fuel live; predrying yes; device calorimeter; site vanWagtendonk1998-1; sampling ND.

      • Shared measurement context: plant part leaves.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 704.6”

          FLAMITS record 13447.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5132.8”

          FLAMITS record 13449.

      • Shared measurement context: plant part litter.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 728.48”

          FLAMITS record 13448.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 4991.88”

          FLAMITS record 13450.

      • Shared measurement context: plant part wood.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5273.72”

          FLAMITS record 13523.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 4965.61”

          FLAMITS record 13524.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5388.36”

          FLAMITS record 13525.

        • “calorific value (kcal/kg): 5056.37”

          FLAMITS record 13526.

    • 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 Varner2022-16; sampling ND.

      • “flame height (cm): 75.1”

        FLAMITS record 15705; Combustibility measurement.

      • Shared measurement context: Sustainability measurement.

        • “flaming duration (s): 90.3”

          FLAMITS record 15706.

        • “smouldering duration (s): 481.7”

          FLAMITS record 15707.

      • “burnt biomass (%): 82.8”

        FLAMITS record 15708; Consumability measurement.

Fire-resistant trees instead

Last verified 2026-08-25. JSON (CC BY 4.0)

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

Pinus monticola (Pine, western white). FireApproved. https://fireapproved.com/plants/pinus-monticola/. Last verified 2026-08-25.