Species
+

Macleaya cordata (Willd.) R.Br.

Five-seed Plume-poppy, Five-seeded Plume-poppy, Plume Poppy, Plume Poppy (EN)

Climate known 72 photographs
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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

Macleaya cordata, the five-seeded plume-poppy, is a species of flowering plant in the poppy family Papaveraceae, which is used ornamentally. It is native to China and Japan. It is a large herbaceous perennial growing to 2.5 m (8 ft) tall by 1 m (3 ft) or more wide, with olive green leaves and airy panicles of buff-white flowers in summer.

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

About the genus · Macleaya

Macleaya, or plume poppy, is a genus of two or three species of flowering plants in the poppy family Papaveraceae, native to Japan and China. They are large rhizomatous herbaceous perennials with palmately lobed, frilly leaves of olive green or grey colour, 25 cm (10 in) long, and tall stems with airy plumes of petal-less, tubular, off-white or cream flowers.

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

Family
Papaveraceae
Described by
(Willd.) R.Br.
Native to
China South-Central, China North-Central, China Southeast +2
Wild records
967 in range· 589 open

At a glance

Warmest month
28°C
Aug, mean day; nights 22 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1750mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jun 229 mm (CHELSA)
Light
16–33DLI
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 1750 mm a year, wettest June at 229 mm, driest December at 55 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 16 to 33 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -5.3 °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 Bocconia cordata (Willd.) R.Br.; Bocconia cordata Willd.; Bocconia cordata subsp. thunbergii Miq.; Bocconia cordata var. japonica (J.N.Haage & E.Schmidt) Regel; Bocconia cordata var. thunbergii Miq. and 13 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 (1307 mm of 1750 mm) falls in April to October, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 20.5 °C against a yearly mean of 14.9 °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 1750 mm a year, wettest June at 229 mm, driest December at 55 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1750 mm a year at the habitat, 1307 mm of it April to October. Wettest month June at 229 mm, driest December at 55 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1352 mm to 2659 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 33 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 16 to 33 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 36).

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 -5.3 °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 -5.3 °C, the absolute minimum -9.8 °C, about 92 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 31.8 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -0.7 °C in January (across the envelope cells -8.5 °C to 3.2 °C), warmest day 28.4 °C in August (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -5.3 °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 66% 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 7 °C in Jan to 28 °C in Aug; mean night from -1 °C in Jan to 22 °C in Aug. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1750 mm of rain a year, most in Jun. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 722 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -9.8 °C and the 99th-percentile day 31.8 °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°frost31.8° 99th-percentile day (undated)-9.8° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400mm rainDLI 16–33RH 59–66 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 722 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 °C7 / 0–108 / 1–1212 / 5–1617 / 12–2221 / 17–2624 / 20–2927 / 24–3228 / 25–3225 / 21–2820 / 15–2415 / 9–1810 / 4–13
Night °C-1 / -9–30 / -8–54 / -4–89 / 2–1414 / 8–1918 / 13–2222 / 17–2522 / 18–2519 / 14–2113 / 8–167 / 1–102 / -5–6
Rain mm70 / 42–12785 / 48–150140 / 84–214146 / 101–246177 / 123–278229 / 158–359212 / 147–339181 / 129–291207 / 91–323155 / 75–22393 / 63–15655 / 35–115
DLI17 / 14–1921 / 15–2426 / 18–2931 / 23–3433 / 27–3630 / 28–3432 / 29–3532 / 29–3425 / 23–2821 / 19–2417 / 15–1916 / 13–18
RH %60 / 54–6460 / 55–6560 / 57–6560 / 58–6462 / 59–6565 / 62–6866 / 61–7065 / 62–6964 / 61–6861 / 59–6560 / 58–6359 / 55–63

Each figure is the median across the 722 grid cells holding the 928 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 1103:6305 (34.825, 135.275). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -9.8 °C, 1st-percentile night -5.3 °C, 99th-percentile day 31.8 °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 722 distinct grid cells holding the 928 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1103:6305 (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 35.00_135.000, lapse-corrected +121 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 333 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.
NativeChina South-Central, China North-Central, China Southeast, Japan, Taiwan· introduced: Czechoslovakia, Germany, Romania, Ukraine, Korea, Ontario, Québec, Illinois, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Alabama, Arkansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia
Kew's description“perennial or rhizomatous geophyte” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker35.637, 139.374 · in the densest population, 422 records (44% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 967 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 589 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 6 km away. 510 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 39 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 967 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Macleaya cordataMacleaya cordataMacleaya cordataMacleaya cordataMacleaya cordataMacleaya cordataMacleaya cordataMacleaya cordata

Photographs: (c) 岸本年郎, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Kaden Slone, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) WATANABE Hitoshi 渡辺仁, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Mike Butler, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Andrew Conboy, some rights reserved (CC BY); no rights reserved · CC0.

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

The chicken gut metagenome and the modulatory effects of plant-derived benzylisoquinoline alkaloids
Peng Huang, Yan Zhang, Kangpeng Xiao, Fan Jiang (2018) · Microbiome
Phytochemical and antimicrobial characterization of Macleaya cordata herb
Pavel Kosina, Jana Gregorová, Jiřı́ Grúz, Jan Vacek (2010) · Fitoterapia
Growth promotion in broilers by both oxytetracycline andMacleaya cordataextract is based on their anti-inflammatory properties
Alireza Khadem, Laura Soler, Nadia Everaert, Théo Niewold (2014) · British Journal Of Nutrition
The effect of a natural feed additive (Macleaya cordata), containing sanguinarine, on the performance and health status of weaning pigs
Dimitrios Kantas, Vasileios G. Papatsiros, Panagiotis Tassis, Labrini V. Athanasiou (2014) · Animal Science Journal
Dietary Macleaya cordata extract supplementation improves the growth performance and gut health of broiler chickens with necrotic enteritis
Bochen Song, Jie He, Xue Pan, Linglian Kong (2023) · Journal of Animal Science and Biotechnology/Journal of animal science and biotechnology
Biosynthesis of Benzo[c]phenanthridine Alkaloids Sanguinarine, Chelirubine and Macarpine
Narao Takao, M. Kamigauchi, Momoyo Okada (1983) · Helvetica Chimica Acta
Sanguinarine modulate gut microbiome and intestinal morphology to enhance growth performance in broilers
Zhuying Liu, Xiaolong Wang, Shu-Qi Ou, De‐Xing Hou (2020) · PLoS ONE

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.

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 116 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.