Enter your ZIP to see whether this is legal to plant in your state, and whether it survives your winter.
Coast azalea is on-list in the evidence table. One source gives Rhododendron atlanticum a firewise placement, while three rows retain a medium flammability classification.
That split in source language is why the record is limited evidence rather than presented as a uniform finding. The recommendation and medium classifications can be compared directly in the source table.
Two minimum-hardiness assertions also differ. The recovered selector prints an uncertain 5, while a temperature record supports an applicable 7b. Both are kept with their own interpretation and provenance in hardiness evidence for direct comparison.
Form
shrub
Mature height
~8 ft
Light
Part sun
Water need
high
Rated in
NC; North Carolina; North Carolina / southeastern US; eastern US
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
The complete three-table AG-874 plant list is explicitly for North Carolina and contains 202 low-, medium-, or high-flammability rows. FireApproved accounts for all source rows under its strict taxonomy and lineage rules; source scope does not establish local suitability at a particular North Carolina site.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Documented in DC, DE, GA, MD, NC, NJ, OH, PA, SC, VA, WV.
Native range
Current cited native range in DE, GA, MD, NC, PA, SC, VA.
Introduced / established
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 7b; no upper limit is documented.
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: 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.
Source location: PlantCharacteristics record 65323, Temperature, Minimum (°F).
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 recommendation)
North Carolina Extension Gardener Plant Toolbox: rhododendron-atlanticum [nc-toolbox-flammability-facet] (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.
