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Fendler’s meadow-rue is consistently recommended for fire-resistant landscaping.
Across six published sources, extension services and Firewise organizations recommend Fendler’s meadow-rue. Oregon State, Washington State, and University of Idaho Extension list it as fire resistant. Oregon State also includes it among fire-resistant plants suited to Willamette Valley conditions and in a perennial gallery for fire-resistant landscapes. Fremont County Firewise places the species under ground covers, while NFPA Firewise Communities lists it among flowers and groundcovers.
These are binary recommendations based on inclusion, not comparative flammability scores. Some are expert-curated guides, while others are compiled regional lists. Fremont County describes its listed plants generally as low-growing, low-debris, and relatively moist, but does not give Fendler’s meadow-rue an individual score. The agreement supports its fire-resistant rating, which rests on limited primary evidence.
Fendler’s meadow-rue is a perennial in the Ranunculaceae family. It is native across parts of the Southwest, Northwest, South-Central, and North-Central United States, and the extension profile places it in USDA zones 3a through 9b.
Form
perennial
Rated in
Black Hills, South Dakota; Fremont County, Wyoming; New Mexico; OR/WA/ID +3
On this lot
1. Fire evidence and conditions
Fire evidence
Fire-resistant — location does not change the cited classification.
Black Hills, South Dakota; Fremont County, Wyoming; New Mexico; OR/WA/ID; Oregon (Willamette Valley); Pacific Northwest (Oregon / Washington / Idaho); southern Idaho / Intermountain
Maintenance
Typed publication scope: 6 scopes across 6 cited fire sources
Black Hills (SD footprint); partial normalized coverage
The page explicitly limits itself to the Black Hills, and NFPA Firewise's archived 2006 plant-list index files it under South Dakota. FireApproved publishes 47 exact genus or species owners from 48 printed rows. This is bounded Black Hills context, not statewide South Dakota coverage or a finding that a plant suits a particular site.
Fremont County (WY footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2011-02-25
The source identifies itself as the Fremont County Firewise Plant List. FireApproved publishes its 92 exact source owners as Fremont County regional context. No methodology, current county endorsement, statewide Wyoming scope, or site-specific suitability is inferred.
Southern Idaho (ID footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2013-11-08
The official database labels itself "For Southern Idaho" and describes Idaho residents at the urban-rangeland interface. FireApproved publishes 419 existing plant owners that cite its scored rows. This bounded Southern Idaho scope is regional context, not statewide coverage or a conclusion that the score transfers unchanged to every Idaho site.
New Mexico Forestry Division publishes this as its FireWise Plant List for New Mexico. FireApproved accounts for all 140 printed rows and publishes 95 exact same-rank owners already represented in the directory; 29 exact taxa without an existing record, 14 unresolved spellings or higher-rank matches, one compound taxon cell, and one species row whose only apparent owner has an infraspecific printed identity remain held. Every published row retains the source's Y, N, ?, or blank elevation cells. Publication scope does not erase those elevation limits or establish suitability for every New Mexico site.
Willamette Valley (OR footprint); partial normalized coverage · 2015-02-01
OSU Extension says EM 9103 highlights fire-resistant plants that thrive under Willamette Valley growing conditions. FireApproved publishes 172 exact owners only as valley context. The guide shares the PNW 590 lineage and is not a second independent vote or statewide site clearance.
The October 2023 joint Pacific Northwest Extension publication explicitly names Oregon, Washington, and Idaho and publishes more than 150 plant profiles. FireApproved has normalized 155 exact plant records from the source; publication scope does not assert that every listed plant suits every site within the three states.
2. Why this plant is relevant here
State distribution
Documented in AZ, CA, CO, ID, NM, NV, OR, TX, UT, WA, WY.
Native range
Current cited native range in AZ, CA, CO, ID, MT, NM, NV, OR, SD, TX, UT, WY.
Introduced / established
USDA hardiness
Documented range 3–9.
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.
3–9 explicit range · whole zone precision · source stated
Source taxon: Thalictrum fendleri · exact match.
Source location: Fendler’s meadowrue profile, USDA hardiness zones field.
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.
Fire Resistance of Plants Master Database: plantable at 40' from home [Idaho minimum planting distance] (mid-scale rating)
Fire-resistant Landscape Plants for the Willamette Valley: Meadow Rue profile (PDF page 66) [osu-em-9103-profile] (with its recommendation)
Firewise Plant Material for the Black Hills: Flowers & groundcovers [black-hills-plant-form-table] (with its recommendation)
FireWise Plant List for New Mexico: PDF page 6, Flowers and Ground Covers, p6-r32 [nm-emnrd-firewise-table-row] (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.
“Fremont County Firewise Plant List — Thalictrum fendleri — Fendler Meadowrue”
Listed in the source's Ground Covers section; the page describes its listed Firewise plants as generally low-growing, low-debris, and relatively moist.
The introduction describes all table entries as fire-resistive plants that can be used in landscaping.
FireWise Plant List for New Mexico — New Mexico Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department, Forestry Division · 2003 Forestry Division PDF · original sourceCorroborationCompilationlineage: csu-nmsu-firewise
“FireWise Plant List for New Mexico”
Listed as Thalictrum fendleri (Fendler meadowrue) in Flowers and Ground Covers. Printed elevation cells: 4,000 ft=N, 5,000 ft=?, 6,000 ft=?, 7,000 ft=Y, 8,000 ft=Y, 9,000+ ft=Y. Water need: H; sun/shade: S/PS; mature height: 2-3’; approximate bloom: Jul-Aug.
