Acalypha virginicaL.

Virginia threeseed mercury

WFO wfo-0000252267 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Acalypha virginica, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. a Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-08-19 / obs. 151904922
Acalypha virginica, photographed by Thomas Koffel
fig. b Thomas Koffel, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 88478644
Acalypha virginica, photographed by Jeff D Hansen
fig. c Jeff D Hansen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 51901207
Acalypha virginica, photographed by jfox16
fig. d jfox16, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 51320459
Acalypha virginica, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. e Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 5094096
Acalypha virginica, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. f Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 4898864
Acalypha virginica, photographed by Sam Kieschnick
fig. g Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 1418404
Acalypha virginica, photographed by Jennifer Harris
fig. h Jennifer Harris, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 48220564

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 31 botanical countries

Regions where Acalypha virginica is native: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia AlabamaArkansasConnecticutGeorgiaIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaMarylandMassachusettsMichiganMississippiMissouriNebraskaNew HampshireNew JerseyNew YorkNorth CarolinaOhioOklahomaPennsylvaniaSouth CarolinaTennesseeTexasVirginiaWest Virginia DelawareDistrict of ColumbiaRhode I.
Native distribution of Acalypha virginica, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
Arkansas ARK
Connecticut CNT
Delaware DEL
District of Columbia WDC
Georgia GEO
Illinois ILL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kansas KAN
Kentucky KTY
Louisiana LOU
Maryland MRY
Massachusetts MAS
Michigan MIC
Mississippi MSI
Missouri MSO
Nebraska NEB
New Hampshire NWH
New Jersey NWJ
New York NWY
North Carolina NCA
Ohio OHI
Oklahoma OKL
Pennsylvania PEN
Rhode I. RHO
South Carolina SCA
Tennessee TEN
Texas TEX
Virginia VRG
West Virginia WVA

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 30 in flower of 42 examined

Peak flowering in Aug. Each bar is the share of Acalypha virginica 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. 30 of 42 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 9 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.cgje2x.

Also published as 16 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Acalypha brevipes Raf.
  • Acalypha caroliniana Walter
  • Acalypha crenulata Raf.
  • Acalypha digyneia Raf.
  • Acalypha echinata Raf.
  • Acalypha urticifolia Raf.
  • Acalypha virginea Dragend.
  • Acalypha virginica f. intermedia Müll.Arg.
  • Acalypha virginica f. intermedia Millsp.
  • Acalypha virginica f. purpurea Farw.
  • Acalypha virginica var. angustifolia Torr.
  • Acalypha virginica var. genuina Müll.Arg.
  • Acalypha virginica var. virginica
  • Ricinocarpus digyneius Kuntze
  • Ricinocarpus urticifolius (Raf.) Kuntze
  • Ricinocarpus virginicus (L.) Kuntze

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.