Arctagrostis latifolia(R.Br.) Griseb.

wideleaf polargrass

WFO wfo-0000848400 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 6 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 6 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by Владимир Береснев
fig. a Владимир Береснев, CC0 1.0 / 2022-02-05 / obs. 178298995
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by nina_nesterova
fig. b nina_nesterova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160833363
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by nina_nesterova
fig. c nina_nesterova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160816701
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by nina_nesterova
fig. d nina_nesterova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160633730
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by Владимир Береснев
fig. e Владимир Береснев, CC0 1.0 / obs. 178299013
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by nina_nesterova
fig. f nina_nesterova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160833341
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by nina_nesterova
fig. g nina_nesterova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160822834
Arctagrostis latifolia, photographed by nina_nesterova
fig. h nina_nesterova, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160706432

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.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
The New York Botanical Garden
Accession
3697349
Filed as
Arctagrostis latifolia subsp. latifolia
Det. by
J. M. Saarela 2015-01-01
Collected
J. M. Saarela 2014-02-07
Origin
CA
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC BY 4.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 29 botanical countries

Regions where Arctagrostis latifolia is native: Amur, Buryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk, Kamchatka, Kazakhstan, Khabarovsk, Krasnoyarsk, Magadan, Mongolia, Tuva, West Siberia, Yakutiya, East European Russia, Finland, North European Russia, Norway, Svalbard, Alaska, British Columbia, Greenland, Labrador, Manitoba, Newfoundland, Northwest Territories, Nunavut, Ontario, Québec, Yukon AmurBuryatiyaChitaIrkutskKamchatkaKazakhstanKhabarovskKrasnoyarskMagadanMongoliaTuvaWest SiberiaYakutiyaEast European RussiaFinlandNorth European RussiaNorwaySvalbardAlaskaBritish ColumbiaGreenlandLabradorManitobaNewfoundlandNorthwest TerritoriesNunavutOntarioQuébecYukon
Native distribution of Arctagrostis latifolia, 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.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Amur AMU ASIA-TEMPERATE
Buryatiya BRY
Chita CTA
Irkutsk IRK
Kamchatka KAM
Kazakhstan KAZ
Khabarovsk KHA
Krasnoyarsk KRA
Magadan MAG
Mongolia MON
Tuva TVA
West Siberia WSB
Yakutiya YAK
Alaska ASK NORTHERN AMERICA
British Columbia BRC
Greenland GNL
Labrador LAB
Manitoba MAN
Newfoundland NFL
Northwest Territories NWT
Nunavut NUN
Ontario ONT
Québec QUE
Yukon YUK
East European Russia RUE EUROPE
Finland FIN
North European Russia RUN
Norway NOR
Svalbard SVA

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.

Where it actually grows measured, from 122 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -34.3 °C -28.8 °C -21.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 6.1 °C 10.8 °C 20.5 °C
Annual rainfall 225 mm 429 mm 1,130 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 21 mm 49 mm 171 mm

It is found where winters are arctic. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 122 research-grade observations of Arctagrostis latifolia that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 18 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.

  • Arctagrostis anadyrensis V.N.Vassil.
  • Arctagrostis aristulata Petrov
  • Arctagrostis glauca Petrov
  • Arctagrostis latifolia f. aristata Holmb.
  • Arctagrostis latifolia f. latifolia
  • Arctagrostis latifolia subsp. gigantea Tzvelev
  • Arctagrostis latifolia subsp. latifolia
  • Arctagrostis latifolia subsp. nahanniensis A.E.Porsild
  • Arctagrostis latifolia var. aristulata (Petrov) Tzvelev
  • Arctagrostis latifolia var. gigantea (Tzvelev) Tzvelev
  • Arctagrostis latifolia var. latifolia
  • Arctagrostis latifolia var. longiglumis Polunin
  • Arctagrostis stricta Petrov
  • Cinna brownii Rupr.
  • Colpodium latifolium R.Br.
  • Colpodium latifolium var. viviparum Scheutz
  • Panicularia latifolia (R.Br.) Kuntze
  • Vilfa xerampelina Trin.

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.