When does Encelia actoni bloom in California?

Most often in May. Across 353 dated, research-grade observations of Encelia actoni in California, the flowering season runs roughly May to November.

Peak May In flower 353 Examined 496 State California

Flowering 353 in flower of 496 examined

54%

44%

75%

95%

88%

75%

38%

50%

74%

93%

67%

Proportion of examined Encelia actoni in California in flower, by month
Month	In flower	Examined	Share	95% interval
Jan	7	13	54%	29% to 77%
Feb	1	14	7%	1% to 31%
Mar	30	68	44%	33% to 56%
Apr	84	112	75%	66% to 82%
May	95	100	95%	89% to 98%
Jun	36	41	88%	74% to 95%
Jul	6	8	75%	41% to 93%
Aug	5	13	38%	18% to 64%
Sep	20	40	50%	35% to 65%
Oct	29	39	74%	59% to 85%
Nov	28	30	93%	79% to 98%
Dec	12	18	67%	44% to 84%

Peak flowering in May. Each bar is the share of Encelia actoni in California 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. 353 of 496 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 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 California found Encelia actoni in flower, not a forecast. It is computed only from observations made in California, 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

Encelia actoni

Sourcesevery claim on this page

GBIF (iNaturalist Research-grade Observations). Dated flowering annotations in California. 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.