Acmella radicans(Jacq.) R.K.Jansen

WFO wfo-0000077487 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Acmella radicans, photographed by alejandrozab
fig. a alejandrozab, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-12-15 / obs. 172636407
Acmella radicans, photographed by Arthur de Jesús Chavarría Pérez
fig. b Arthur de Jesús Chavarría Pérez, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 94646629
Acmella radicans, photographed by Dinesh Valke
fig. c Dinesh Valke, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 136300937
Acmella radicans, photographed by alejandrozab
fig. d alejandrozab, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 59221381
Acmella radicans, photographed by Dayan Romero
fig. e Dayan Romero, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 28960528
Acmella radicans, photographed by Fredy
fig. f Fredy, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 12092162
Acmella radicans, photographed by S.MORE
fig. g S.MORE, CC0 1.0 / obs. 60144843
Acmella radicans, photographed by Dinesh Valke
fig. h Dinesh Valke, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 161727476

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 23 botanical countries

Regions where Acmella radicans is native: Mexico Central, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Leeward Is., Nicaragua, Panamá, Peru, Puerto Rico, Trinidad-Tobago, Venezuela, Venezuelan Antilles, Windward Is. Mexico CentralMexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico NorthwestMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestBoliviaColombiaCosta RicaCubaDominican RepublicEl SalvadorGuatemalaHondurasNicaraguaPanamáPeruPuerto RicoTrinidad-TobagoVenezuela Leeward Is.Venezuelan AntillesWindward Is.
Native distribution of Acmella radicans, 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
Bolivia BOL SOUTHERN AMERICA
Colombia CLM
Costa Rica COS
Cuba CUB
Dominican Republic DOM
El Salvador ELS
Guatemala GUA
Honduras HON
Leeward Is. LEE
Nicaragua NIC
Panamá PAN
Peru PER
Puerto Rico PUE
Trinidad-Tobago TRT
Venezuela VEN
Venezuelan Antilles VNA
Windward Is. WIN
Mexico Central MXC NORTHERN AMERICA
Mexico Gulf MXG
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Northwest MXN
Mexico Southeast MXT
Mexico Southwest MXS

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 41 in flower of 44 examined

Peak flowering in Oct. Each bar is the share of Acmella radicans 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. 41 of 44 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.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.

  • Acmella debilis Cass.
  • Acmella tenella (Kunth) Cass.
  • Ceratocephalus debilis (Kunth) Kuntze
  • Ceratocephalus exasperatus (Jacq.) Kuntze
  • Ceratocephalus tenellus (Kunth) Kuntze
  • Sanvitalia longepedunculata M.E.Jones
  • Spilanthes botterii S.Watson
  • Spilanthes debilis Kunth
  • Spilanthes exasperata Jacq.
  • Spilanthes exasperata var. cayennensis DC.
  • Spilanthes exasperata var. exasperata
  • Spilanthes leucophaea Sch.Bip. ex Klatt
  • Spilanthes mandonii Sch.Bip.
  • Spilanthes ocymifolia var. acutiserrata A.H.Moore
  • Spilanthes radicans Jacq.
  • Spilanthes tenella Kunth

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. 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.