Species
+

Robinia pseudoacacia L.

Acachieu, Agassiå, Aglassiå, Black Locust

Climate known 61 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

Robinia pseudoacacia, commonly known as black locust, is a medium-sized hardwood deciduous tree, belonging to the tribe Robinieae of the legume family. Another common name is false acacia, a literal translation of the specific name.

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

About the genus · Robinia

Robinia is a genus of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae, tribe Robinieae, native to North America. Commonly known as locusts, they are deciduous trees and shrubs growing 4–25 metres (13–82 ft) tall. The leaves are pinnate with 7–21 oval leaflets. More on Wikipedia ›

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

Family
Fabaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Alabama +7
Wild records
67 in range· 7 open

At a glance

Warmest month
30°C
Jul, mean day; nights 20 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1151mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jul 115 mm (CHELSA)
Light
13–40DLI
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 8 months (March to September and December in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 1151 mm a year, wettest July at 115 mm, driest February at 76 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 13 to 40 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -13.8 °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 Aeschynomene pseudoacacia Roxb.; Aeschynomene pseudoacacia Roxb. ex DC.; Pseudacacia odorata Moench; Pseudacacia vulgaris Tourn.; Pseudacacia vulgaris Tourn. ex Greene and 45 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (March to September and 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 (816 mm of 1151 mm) takes 8 months, March to September and December. Mean temperature moves 24.1 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: September to March and June.

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 1151 mm a year, wettest July at 115 mm, driest February at 76 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1151 mm a year at the habitat, 816 mm of it March to September and December. Wettest month July at 115 mm, driest February at 76 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1037 mm to 1353 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: 13 to 40 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 13 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 11, the highest 90th-percentile month 40).

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 -13.8 °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 -13.8 °C, the absolute minimum -26.5 °C, about 108 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 35.0 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -3.0 °C in January (across the envelope cells -5.6 °C to 1.4 °C), warmest day 29.6 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -13.8 °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 59% 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 30 °C in Jul; mean night from -3 °C in Jan to 20 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1151 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 60 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -26.5 °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.-40°-20°20°40°frost35.0° 99th-percentile day (undated)-26.5° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125150mm rainDLI 13–40RH 55–59 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 60 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 / 2–107 / 4–1312 / 9–1718 / 16–2223 / 20–2627 / 25–3030 / 26–3129 / 26–3125 / 23–2719 / 16–2213 / 11–167 / 4–11
Night °C-3 / -6–1-2 / -5–32 / -1–67 / 5–1012 / 10–1518 / 15–2020 / 17–2219 / 17–2116 / 13–1810 / 7–125 / 2–8-1 / -3–3
Rain mm85 / 69–10776 / 70–115101 / 88–12793 / 86–108106 / 92–127106 / 96–123115 / 101–136102 / 86–120101 / 84–11188 / 71–9986 / 76–10892 / 78–108
DLI14 / 13–1720 / 18–2127 / 25–2934 / 32–3637 / 36–3940 / 39–4038 / 37–3934 / 34–3528 / 27–3022 / 21–2415 / 14–1813 / 11–15
RH %57 / 56–6056 / 55–5855 / 54–5755 / 54–5657 / 56–6058 / 57–6259 / 57–6359 / 58–6259 / 58–6157 / 57–6058 / 56–5957 / 56–60

Each figure is the median across the 60 grid cells holding the 64 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 1004:2097 (39.775, -75.125). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -26.5 °C, 1st-percentile night -13.8 °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 60 distinct grid cells holding the 64 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1004:2097 (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 40.00_-75.000, lapse-corrected -26 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 21 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.
NativePennsylvania, West Virginia, Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia· introduced: Great Britain, Ireland, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Baleares, Corse, France, Sardegna, Spain, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Kriti, Romania, Sicilia, Turkey-in-Europe, Yugoslavia, Belarus, Baltic States, Krym, Central European Russia, East European Russia, South European Russia, Ukraine, Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Azores, Canary Is., Madeira, Cape Provinces, Lesotho, KwaZulu-Natal, Free State, Northern Provinces, Réunion, Khabarovsk, Kuril Is., Primorye, Sakhalin, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Turkmenistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, East Aegean Is., Iraq, Lebanon-Syria, Palestine, Turkey, China South-Central, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, China North-Central, Qinghai, China Southeast, Xinjiang, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, India, Pakistan, West Himalaya, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, Western Australia, New Zealand North, New Zealand South, Easter Is., British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Québec, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Rhode I., Vermont, Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, District of Columbia, Mexico Northwest, Argentina Northeast, Chile Central
Kew's description“shrub or tree” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker39.97, -75.186 · in the densest population, 26 records (39% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 67 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 7 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 136 km away. 670 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 3 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 67 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Robinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacaciaRobinia pseudoacacia

Photographs: (c) Sandy Wolkenberg, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Douglas Goldman, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (4); (c) Tom Scavo, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3).

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

How much does climate change threaten European forest tree species distributions?
Marcin K. Dyderski, Sonia Paź‐Dyderska, Lee E. Frelich, Andrzej M. Jagodziński (2017) · Global Change Biology
Alien flora of Europe: species diversity, temporal trends, geographical patterns and research needs.
Philip W. L, B Corina, Kew Herbarium, A. Del Moro (2008) · Preslia
Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia) beloved and despised: A story of an invasive tree in Central Europe
Michaela Vítková, Jana Müllerová, Jiřı́ Sádlo, Jan Pergl (2016) · Forest Ecology and Management
Recent Advances in Legume Transformation
David A. Somers, Deborah A. Samac, Paula M. Olhoft (2003) · PLANT PHYSIOLOGY
Biological Flora of the British Isles: Robinia pseudoacacia
Arne Cierjacks, Ingo Kowarik, Jasmin Joshi, Stefan Hempel (2013) · Journal of Ecology
Soil moisture and evapotranspiration of different land cover types in the Loess Plateau, China
Shuai Wang, Bojie Fu, Guangyao Gao, Xueling Yao (2012) · Hydrology and earth system sciences

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 Robinia 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 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 9 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.