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English yew cannot be called simply fire resistant: four sources warn against it, while one Catalan guide strongly recommends it.
On the USDA Forest Service and state Firewise programs’ four-step scale, English yew falls at the unfavorable end: “Not Firewise.” The H flammability ratings from the two extension services occupy different positions: fourth of five for Ohio State University Extension, highest of three for Virginia Cooperative Extension. Greece’s 2023 fire-protection regulation lists Taxus baccata among particularly flammable endemic trees and shrubs.
The contrary judgment comes from the Diputació de Girona and Bombers de la Generalitat de Catalunya, whose 2020 Spanish edition calls English yew “very recommended.” Its qualitative garden-suitability method is broader than a flammability rating. That recommendation assumes species-specific care. Fuel structure, maintenance, origin and invasiveness enter the judgment alongside fire-resistance literature and fire-service experience. The American sources use Firewise or expert-curated flammability scales, while the Greek source is a regulation for properties within or near forest land. The sources differ in method and region, but those differences do not establish why they disagree.
English yew is a low-water tree in the Taxaceae family, reaching about 15 feet at maturity. The strong Catalan recommendation prevents a unanimous warning, but the unfavorable American and Greek findings prevent a clear claim of fire resistance. For a homeowner, the honest conclusion is that its fire performance remains disputed rather than settled.
Ohio State University Extension Bulletin 921 is an Ohio publication that describes Ohio fire seasons and landscape conditions and labels nativity to Ohio. FireApproved publishes 352 exact source-owning plant records from its eight rated tables. This historical publication scope does not assert current extension endorsement or that a listed plant suits every Ohio site.
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 DC, DE, MA, MD, NJ, NY, OH, PA, WA, WV.
Native range
Introduced / established
2 sourced range or established records. This is not an invasive warning.
USDA hardiness
Documented minimum 4a; 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 prints 5 · single-value meaning unresolved · whole zone precision · source stated
Source taxon: Taxus baccata · exact match.
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 15633, 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 avoid rating)
Firewise Landscaping: do not plant within 5 ft of structures (keep out of Zone 1) [OSU B921 source-category siting] (with its avoid rating)
Guía de pirojardinería: suitable inside or outside the 25-metre maximum-risk zone [girona-2020-iuf-25m-suitability] (with its recommendation)
Κανονισμός Πυροπροστασίας Ακινήτων εντός ή πλησίον δασικώ…: section 5.4.2, Table 2δi [greece-2023-particularly-flammable] (with its avoid 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.
Taxus baccata is rated “MUY 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.
