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Creeping snowberry has favorable fire-performance ratings, but they do not establish that it is fire resistant.
The University of California Forest Products Laboratory placed this groundcover among plants recommended by four references for use in high fire risk areas. The Diablo Firesafe Council also put creeping snowberry in its favorable table, which is reserved for plants receiving favorable ratings in at least three references. Its row cites four of the guide’s 57 numbered references. The university report compiles more than 25 earlier lists, while the council guide publishes two lists and the reference key behind them.
Those systems have clear limits. The university report identifies two problems with the earlier lists: they often lack a scientific basis, and their terms are undefined. The council likewise says the ranking terms in its references were mostly undefined. A favorable classification therefore shows repeated landscape recommendations, but it does not supply a standard definition of fire resistance.
Creeping snowberry, or Symphoricarpos mollis, is a groundcover in the family Caprifoliaceae and is native in the southwestern United States. Its fire-performance guidance is encouraging but unsettled. The sound conclusion is that it may merit consideration for a fire-conscious landscape, while its status as a fire-resistant plant remains unconfirmed.
Form
groundcover
Rated in
California
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Mixed evidence — location does not change the cited classification.
The guide presents itself as fire performance ratings for common landscape plants in a fire-prone California setting. FireApproved publishes 104 exact owners as republished California context. It is not an independent rating, a current endorsement, or parcel suitability.
The UC Forest Products Laboratory says the guide covers properties of common California landscaping plants and was prepared for California fire agencies. FireApproved publishes 130 exact owners at historical California publication scope. The report is a 1997 compilation, not a current endorsement, site rating, or independent test of every row.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Documented in CA, NV.
Native range
Current cited native range in CA, NV.
Introduced / established
USDA hardiness
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.
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.
Defensible Space Landscaping in the Urban/Wildland Interf…: Chapter 4, Landscape Vegetation Database [ucfpl-1997] (with its recommendation)
Fire Performance of Common Plants: Table 1 (favorable in 3 or more references) [diablo-guide-to-plants-three-reference-vote] (with its recommendation)
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.
Fire Performance of Common Plants (Guide to Plants) — Diablo Firesafe Council · live page captured 2026-08-29 · original sourceCorroborationMirrorlineage: ucfpl-berkeley resolves to Defensible Space Landscaping in the Urban/Wildland Interface: A Compilation of Fire Performance Ratings of Residential Landscape Plants
“Table 1: favorable fire performance rating in 3 or more references (refs 11,15,40,41)”
The Diablo Firesafe Council Guide to Plants lists Symphoricarpos mollis (Waxberry, Creeping snowberry, Trip vine) as groundcover, deciduous, in Table 1: plants with a favorable fire performance rating in 3 or more references. The guide cites 4 of its 57 numbered references for this row (11,15,40,41). The guide states the ranking terms in its underlying references were mostly undefined and makes no attempt to rank within the list, and that fire performance is compromised without maintenance.
