Species
+

Agastache scrophulariifolia (Willd.) Kuntze

Purple giant hyssop, figwort giant-hyssop, purple giant hyssop, purple giant-hyssop

Climate known 67 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Agastache scrophulariifolia, also known as the purple giant hyssop, is a perennial plant that grows throughout the United States and northern Ontario, Canada. Its name comes from the similarity of its leaves to plants of the genus Scrophularia. It is a beneficial plant to pollinators and is noted for its medicinal properties, as many plants in the mint family are. It tends to grow in disturbed or open areas where it does not have to interact with non-native competitive plants.

Text from Wikipedia, “Agastache scrophulariifolia”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Agastache

Agastache is a genus of aromatic flowering herbaceous perennial plants in the family Lamiaceae. It contains 22 species, mainly native to North America, one species native to eastern Asia. The common names of the species are a variety of fairly ambiguous and confusing "hyssops" and "mints"; as a whole the genus is known as giant hyssops or hummingbird mints.

Text from Wikipedia, “Agastache”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Lamiaceae
Described by
(Willd.) Kuntze
Native to
Ontario, Illinois, Iowa +15
Wild records
1092 in range· 300 open

At a glance

Warmest month
28°C
Jul, mean day; nights 18 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
945mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jun 117 mm (CHELSA)
Light
10–40DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: a summer growing season, April to October in the northern hemisphere (April to October at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 945 mm a year, wettest June at 117 mm, driest January at 34 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 40 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -24.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Agastache scrophulariifolia var. mollis (Fernald) A.Heller; Agastache scrophulariifolia var. scrophulariifolia; Hyssopus catariifolius Benth.; Hyssopus scrophulariifolius Willd.; Lophanthus scrophularicefolius var. mollis Fernald and 6 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a summer growing season, April to October in the northern hemisphere (April to October at the habitat, northern).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the year's rain (706 mm of 945 mm) falls in April to October, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 16.4 °C against a yearly mean of 8.8 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: October to April.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 945 mm a year, wettest June at 117 mm, driest January at 34 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

945 mm a year at the habitat, 706 mm of it April to October. Wettest month June at 117 mm, driest January at 34 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 830 mm to 1282 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 40 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 10 to 40 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 9, the highest 90th-percentile month 41).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -24.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -24.1 °C, the absolute minimum -39.4 °C, about 148 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 33.1 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -10.3 °C in January (across the envelope cells -13.4 °C to -4.8 °C), warmest day 27.6 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -24.1 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 55 to 63% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from -2 °C in Jan to 28 °C in Jul; mean night from -10 °C in Jan to 18 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 945 mm of rain a year, most in Jun. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 615 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -39.4 °C and the 99th-percentile day 33.1 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-60°-40°-20°20°40°frost33.1° 99th-percentile day (undated)-39.4° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125150mm rainDLI 10–40RH 55–63 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 615 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C-2 / -5–41 / -1–67 / 5–1114 / 13–1720 / 19–2225 / 24–2728 / 26–2926 / 25–2822 / 21–2415 / 14–187 / 5–110 / -3–5
Night °C-10 / -13–-5-8 / -11–-4-3 / -5–04 / 3–610 / 9–1216 / 14–1718 / 17–2017 / 16–1913 / 12–167 / 6–90 / -2–4-7 / -10–-2
Rain mm34 / 21–8939 / 21–8254 / 44–10692 / 74–110104 / 92–125117 / 104–133112 / 98–128114 / 95–12693 / 84–11574 / 62–10565 / 46–10547 / 29–102
DLI13 / 12–1419 / 18–2026 / 25–2732 / 32–3337 / 37–3840 / 39–4140 / 38–4134 / 33–3627 / 26–2919 / 18–2112 / 11–1510 / 9–12
RH %63 / 58–6560 / 56–6257 / 56–5955 / 54–5756 / 54–5857 / 56–6058 / 57–6059 / 58–6058 / 57–6057 / 57–5959 / 58–6162 / 58–65

Each figure is the median across the 615 grid cells holding the 1014 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 943:1831 (42.825, -88.425). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -39.4 °C, 1st-percentile night -24.1 °C, 99th-percentile day 33.1 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 615 distinct grid cells holding the 1014 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 943:1831 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 43.00_-88.125, lapse-corrected +8 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 259 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeOntario, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Vermont, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, Tennessee
Kew's description“perennial” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker43.069, -89.484 · in the densest population, 425 records (39% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1092 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 300 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 4 km away. 93 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 78 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 1092 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Agastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifoliaAgastache scrophulariifolia

Photographs: (c) Jeff Hansen, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Summit Metro Parks, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); no rights reserved · CC0 (5).

Photographs: iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Agastache scrophulariifolia, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Landscape enhancement of floral resources for honey bees in agro-ecosystems
Axel Decourtye, Eric Mader, Nicolas Desneux (2010) · Apidologie
Comparative pollen morphology and ultrastructure of Mentheae subtribe Nepetinae (Lamiaceae)
Hye‐Kyoung Moon, Stefan Vinckier, Erik Smets, Suzy Huysmans (2008) · Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology
A checklist of New York State plants
Richard S. Mitchell (1986) · Bulletin - New York State Museum
Patterns of plant invasions at sites with rare plant species throughout new England
Elizabeth J. Farnsworth (2004) · Biodiversity Heritage Library (Smithsonian Institution)
Floral Resources Used by the Endangered Rusty Patched Bumble Bee (Bombus affinis) in the Midwestern United States
Amy Wolf, Jay C. Watson, Terrell J. Hyde, Susan G. Carpenter (2022) · Natural Areas Journal
Agastache Species: A Comprehensive Review on Phytochemical Composition and Therapeutic Properties
Mihaela-Ancuța Nechita, Anca Toiu, Daniela Benedec, Daniela Hanganu (2023) · Plants
Phenological Assessment for Agronomic Suitability of Some Agastache Species Based on Standardized BBCH Scale
Rodica Vârban, Andreea Ona, Andrei Stoie, Dan Vârban (2021) · Agronomy
More Than Just Plants: Botanical Gardens Are an Untapped Source of Fungal Diversity
Michael Bradshaw, Luis Quijada, Patrick C. Tobin, Uwe Braun (2022) · HortScience
Modelling plant morphometric parameters as predictors for successful cultivation of some medicinal Agastache species
Rodica Vârban, Roxana Vidican, Andreea Ona, Dan Vârban (2022) · Notulae Botanicae Horti Agrobotanici Cluj-Napoca
Lessons From an Inventory of the Ames, Iowa, Flora (1859-2000)
William R. Norris, Deborah Q. Lewis, Mark P. Widrlechner, Jimmie D. Thompson (2001) · Iowa State University Digital Repository (Iowa State University)

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Agastache 1 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 56 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.