Species
+

Echium vulgare L.

Blue Echium, Blue Thistle, Blue-devil, Blueweed

Climate known 66 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

Echium vulgare, known as viper's bugloss and blueweed, is a species of flowering plant in the borage family Boraginaceae. It is native to most of Europe and western and central Asia and it occurs as an introduced species in north-eastern North America, south-western South America and the South and North Island of New Zealand. If eaten, the plant is toxic to horses and cattle through the accumulation of pyrrolizidine alkaloids in the liver.

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

About the genus · Echium

Echium is a genus of flowering plants in the family Boraginaceae that contains about 70 species and several subspecies.

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

Family
Boraginaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Denmark, Finland, Great Britain +47
Wild records
452 in range· 121 open

At a glance

Warmest month
23°C
Jul, mean day; nights 15 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
853mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Oct 83 mm (CHELSA)
Light
6–36DLI
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: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (June to January in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 853 mm a year, wettest October at 83 mm, driest April at 52 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 6 to 36 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -5.6 °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 Echium argentii Pau; Echium vulgare f. vulgare; Echium vulgare var. vulgare.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (June to January in the northern hemisphere).

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

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (613 mm of 853 mm) takes 8 months, June to January. Mean temperature moves 16.3 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: December to July.

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 853 mm a year, wettest October at 83 mm, driest April at 52 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

853 mm a year at the habitat, 613 mm of it June to January. Wettest month October at 83 mm, driest April at 52 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 591 mm to 1211 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: 6 to 36 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 6 to 36 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 3, the highest 90th-percentile month 45).

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 -5.6 °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 -5.6 °C, the absolute minimum -12.5 °C, about 71 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 35.0 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -0.2 °C in January (across the envelope cells -6.1 °C to 4.2 °C), warmest day 23.0 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -5.6 °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: 59 to 67% 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 5 °C in Jan to 23 °C in Jul; mean night from -0 °C in Jan to 15 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 853 mm of rain a year, most in Oct. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 385 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -12.5 °C and the 99th-percentile day 35.0 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-20°-10°10°20°30°40°frost35.0° 99th-percentile day (undated)-12.5° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125150mm rainDLI 6–36RH 59–67 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 385 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 °C5 / 1–106 / 2–1110 / 5–1413 / 10–1718 / 15–2121 / 18–2523 / 20–2823 / 20–2819 / 16–2414 / 12–199 / 6–146 / 2–11
Night °C-0 / -6–40 / -5–42 / -2–65 / 2–99 / 7–1312 / 11–1615 / 13–1915 / 13–1912 / 9–168 / 5–134 / -0–81 / -5–5
Rain mm71 / 36–9057 / 33–7964 / 37–8852 / 37–10267 / 50–11771 / 41–12176 / 23–11674 / 42–11878 / 54–11183 / 46–12580 / 47–12780 / 44–117
DLI8 / 5–1313 / 9–1920 / 16–2829 / 26–3534 / 32–4036 / 33–4435 / 32–4530 / 27–3922 / 18–2914 / 11–208 / 5–146 / 3–11
RH %66 / 59–6963 / 58–6661 / 57–6459 / 56–6259 / 57–6259 / 56–6259 / 54–6360 / 55–6262 / 58–6364 / 61–6566 / 60–6867 / 59–70

Each figure is the median across the 385 grid cells holding the 442 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 981:3517 (40.925, -4.125). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -12.5 °C, 1st-percentile night -5.6 °C, 99th-percentile day 35.0 °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 385 distinct grid cells holding the 442 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 981:3517 (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 41.00_-4.375, lapse-corrected +7 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1024 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.
NativeDenmark, Finland, Great Britain, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Corse, France, Portugal, Sardegna, Spain, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Romania, Sicilia, Turkey-in-Europe, Yugoslavia, Belarus, Baltic States, Krym, Central European Russia, East European Russia, South European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ukraine, Altay, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, West Siberia, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Turkmenistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Turkey, Xinjiang· introduced: Algeria, Morocco, Cape Provinces, Lesotho, Free State, Northern Provinces, Buryatiya, Kamchatka, Khabarovsk, Primorye, Sakhalin, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, New Zealand North, New Zealand South, Alaska, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward I., Québec, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, District of Columbia, Argentina South, Argentina Northwest, Chile Central, Chile South
Kew's description“annual or biennial” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker51.296, 4.333 · in the densest population, 93 records (21% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 452 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 121 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 612 km away. 304 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 10 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 452 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Echium vulgareEchium vulgareEchium vulgareEchium vulgareEchium vulgareEchium vulgareEchium vulgareEchium vulgare

Photographs: (c) Tom Norton, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Blake Bringhurst, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); no rights reserved · CC0.

Photographs: iNaturalist and GBIF media 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 Echium vulgare, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

A Survey of the Antibacterial Activity of Some New Zealand Honeys
Kerry L. Allen, P. C. Molan, Gordon McGregor Reid (1991) · Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology
Is there evidence for the post‐invasion evolution of increased size among invasive plant species?
A. J. Willis, Jane Memmott, R. I. Forrester (2000) · Ecology Letters
Bee visits and the nectar of Echium vulgare L. and Sinapis alba L.
Sarah A. Corbet (1978) · Ecological Entomology
Plant Naturalizations and Invasions in the Eastern United States: 1634-1860
Richard N. Mack (2003) · Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden
Host‐plant finding and recognition by visual and olfactory floral cues in an oligolectic bee
Hannah Burger, Stefan Dötterl, Manfred Ayasse (2010) · Functional Ecology
Pollen dynamics of bumble‐bee visitation on Echium vulgare
M. C. J. Rademaker, Tom J. de Jong, Peter G. L. Klinkhamer (1997) · Functional Ecology
Pyrrolizidine Alkaloids of Echium vulgare Honey Found in Pure Pollen
Michael Boppré, Steven M. Colegate, J. A. Edgar (2005) · Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry
Comparison of some secondary metabolite content in the seventeen species of the Boraginaceae family
Sławomir Dresler, Grażyna Szymczak, Małgorzata Wójcik (2017) · Pharmaceutical Biology
Pyrrolizidine alkaloids in pollen and pollen products
Michael Kempf, Sandra G. Heil, Iris Haßlauer, Lukas Schmidt (2009) · Molecular Nutrition & Food Research

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 Echium 2 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 search API
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 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)
gbif.media did not answercarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: api.gbif.org not asked: offline re-derivation
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 11 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.