Species
+

Helianthus angustifolius L.

Swamp sunflower, narrow-leaf sunflower, swamp sneezeweed, swamp sunflower

Climate known 108 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

Helianthus angustifolius is a species of sunflower known by the common name narrowleaf sunflower or swamp sunflower. It is native to the south-central and eastern United States, found in all the coastal states from Texas to Long Island, and inland as far as Missouri. It is typically found in the coastal plain habitat, particularly in wet areas. Although, in general, this species prefers low, moist ground, it is tolerant of conditions varying from bogs and swamps near sea level to relatively dry, well drained, gravelly clay. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Helianthus angustifolius”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Helianthus

Helianthus is a genus comprising around 50 species of annual and perennial flowering plants in the daisy family Asteraceae commonly known as sunflowers. The species of Helianthus are native to North America. The best-known species is the common sunflower. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Helianthus”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Asteraceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Iowa, Missouri, Oklahoma +19
Wild records
1762 in range· 553 open

At a glance

Warmest month
32°C
Jul, mean day; nights 23 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1349mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jul 127 mm (CHELSA)
Light
16–40DLI
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: no season, 70% of the rain takes 9 months (February to March, May to September and November to December in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 1349 mm a year, wettest July at 127 mm, driest October at 99 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 16 to 40 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -6.0 °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 Coreopsis angustifolia (L.) L.; Discomela angustifolius (L.) Raf.; Helianthus agustifolius L.; Helianthus angustifolius (L.) Michx.; Helianthus angustifolius (L.) Michx. ex DC., 1836 and 6 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 9 months (February to March, May to September and November to December 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 (1043 mm of 1349 mm) takes 9 months, February to March, May to September and November to December. Mean temperature moves 18.9 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to March, May to June and August to September.

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 1349 mm a year, wettest July at 127 mm, driest October at 99 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1349 mm a year at the habitat, 1043 mm of it February to March, May to September and November to December. Wettest month July at 127 mm, driest October at 99 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1169 mm to 1640 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: 16 to 40 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 16 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 13, 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 -6.0 °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 -6.0 °C, the absolute minimum -16.4 °C, about 37 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 40.5 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 4.3 °C in January (across the envelope cells -0.9 °C to 10.1 °C), warmest day 31.9 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -6.0 °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: 56 to 61% 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 14 °C in Jan to 32 °C in Jul; mean night from 4 °C in Jan to 23 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1349 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 1260 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -16.4 °C and the 99th-percentile day 40.5 °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°50°frost40.5° 99th-percentile day (undated)-16.4° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250mm rainDLI 16–40RH 56–61 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 1260 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 °C14 / 7–1916 / 10–2020 / 14–2324 / 19–2628 / 24–3031 / 28–3232 / 30–3332 / 29–3429 / 26–3125 / 20–2719 / 14–2315 / 9–20
Night °C4 / -1–106 / 1–119 / 4–1413 / 9–1718 / 14–2122 / 19–2423 / 21–2523 / 21–2520 / 17–2315 / 12–1910 / 6–156 / 1–12
Rain mm104 / 73–141107 / 74–146119 / 91–151103 / 70–129114 / 73–143126 / 101–191127 / 95–200117 / 77–205108 / 88–17199 / 77–136111 / 58–132114 / 70–151
DLI18 / 15–2122 / 20–2629 / 27–3336 / 34–3939 / 37–4140 / 39–4139 / 38–4136 / 34–3831 / 29–3225 / 23–2719 / 16–2216 / 13–19
RH %58 / 57–6058 / 56–5957 / 55–5956 / 55–5958 / 57–6160 / 58–6361 / 58–6461 / 57–6459 / 57–6358 / 56–6058 / 57–5959 / 57–60

Each figure is the median across the 1260 grid cells holding the 1615 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 1149:1745 (32.525, -92.725). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -16.4 °C, 1st-percentile night -6.0 °C, 99th-percentile day 40.5 °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 1260 distinct grid cells holding the 1615 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1149:1745 (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 32.50_-92.500, lapse-corrected +30 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 94 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.
NativeIowa, Missouri, Oklahoma, Indiana, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia· introduced: Jawa
Map marker29.859, -95.162 · in the densest population, 1135 records (64% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1762 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 553 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 46 km away. 4 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 147 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 inside the densest 4° block of the 1762 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Helianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifoliusHelianthus angustifolius

Photographs: (c) Sam Kieschnick, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Michael J. Papay, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Yj, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3).

Photographs: iNaturalist 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 Helianthus angustifolius, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

EST Databases as a Source for Molecular Markers: Lessons from Helianthus
Catherine H. Pashley (2006) · Journal of Heredity
High genetic diversity in a rare and endangered sunflower as compared to a common congener
J. R. ELLIS, Catherine H. Pashley, John M. Burke, David E. McCauley (2006) · Molecular Ecology
Physiological Mechanisms of Drought Resistance in Four Native Ornamental Perennials
Douglas S. Chapman, Robert M. Augé (1994) · Journal of the American Society for Horticultural Science
Diterpene carboxylic acids and a heliangolide from Helianthus angustifolius
Nobuo Ohno, Jonathan Gershenzon, Paula Neuman, Tom J. Mabry (1981) · Phytochemistry
Hymenoxin: A flavone from Helianthus angustifolius
Thomas G. Waddell (1973) · Phytochemistry
Using Compost for Container Production of Ornamental Wetland and Flatwood Species Native to Florida
Sandra B. Wilson, Peter J. Stoffella (2006) · Native Plants Journal
Cytotoxic Furanogermacranolides from the Flowers ofHelianthus angustifolius
Nadine Kretschmer, Martina Blunder, Olaf Kunert, Gerald N. Rechberger (2011) · Planta Medica
Using Compost for Container Production of Ornamental Wetland and Flatwood Species Native to Florida
Sandra B. Wilson, Peter J. Stoffella (2006) · Native Plants Journal
Occurrence Download
GBIF.Org User (2023) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Another Coastal Plain Sphagnum in Tennessee
Aaron J. Sharp (1947) · The Bryologist
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility

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 Helianthus 6 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (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 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; 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 79 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.