When does red columbine bloom in Illinois?

Most often in May. Across 543 dated, research-grade observations of Aquilegia canadensis in Illinois, the flowering season runs roughly May to July.

Peak May In flower 543 Examined 625 State Illinois

Flowering 543 in flower of 625 examined

20%

63%

98%

97%

80%

Proportion of examined Aquilegia canadensis in Illinois in flower, by month
Month	In flower	Examined	Share	95% interval
Jan	0	1	too few examined
Feb	0	1	too few examined
Mar	5	25	20%	9% to 39%
Apr	77	122	63%	54% to 71%
May	353	359	98%	96% to 99%
Jun	99	102	97%	92% to 99%
Jul	8	10	80%	49% to 94%
Aug	1	3	too few examined
Sep	0	0	too few examined
Oct	0	1	too few examined
Nov	0	1	too few examined
Dec	0	0	too few examined

Peak flowering in May. Each bar is the share of Aquilegia canadensis in Illinois observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 543 of 625 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 7 months have fewer than 5 examined observations, so no proportion is drawn for them. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.wt38fd.

What this is, and what it is not

This is a record of when people in Illinois found Aquilegia canadensis in flower, not a forecast. It is computed only from observations made in Illinois, so it is not the species’ global average dragged onto a map: the same plant flowers on different dates in different places, and that is the entire point of the page.

It will not tell you what your particular plant will do this year. Bloom time moves with the season, with altitude, and with the weather, and a warm February pulls everything forward. We publish the distribution and the sample size, and we refuse to draw a month that too few people examined.

The plant

Aquilegia canadensis

red columbine

Sourcesevery claim on this page

GBIF (iNaturalist Research-grade Observations). Dated flowering annotations in Illinois. Every record achieved iNaturalist quality grade Research, which is applied upstream at export. 10.15468/dl.wt38fd. Retrieved 2026-07-14.
World Flora Online Plant List. The accepted name. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.