Calliandra tergemina(L.) Benth.

WFO wfo-0000174010 Accepted WFO 2026-06 4 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–d · 2 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 2 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.

Calliandra tergemina, photographed by Center for Urban Ecology
fig. a Center for Urban Ecology, CC0 1.0 / 2022-04-29 / obs. 194429363
Calliandra tergemina, photographed by Center for Urban Ecology
fig. b Center for Urban Ecology, CC0 1.0 / obs. 194429237
Calliandra tergemina, photographed by Center for Urban Ecology
fig. c Center for Urban Ecology, CC0 1.0 / obs. 194429202
Calliandra tergemina, photographed by johnyochum
fig. d johnyochum, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 193372654

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 17 botanical countries

Regions where Calliandra tergemina is native: Mexico Central, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panamá, Trinidad-Tobago, Venezuela, Windward Is. Mexico CentralMexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico NorthwestMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestBelizeColombiaCosta RicaEl SalvadorGuatemalaHondurasNicaraguaPanamáTrinidad-TobagoVenezuela Windward Is.
Native distribution of Calliandra tergemina, 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
Belize BLZ SOUTHERN AMERICA
Colombia CLM
Costa Rica COS
El Salvador ELS
Guatemala GUA
Honduras HON
Nicaragua NIC
Panamá PAN
Trinidad-Tobago TRT
Venezuela VEN
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.

Where it actually grows measured, from 253 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 10.8 °C 18.8 °C 24.7 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 27.2 °C 30.5 °C 34.6 °C
Annual rainfall 817 mm 1,934 mm 2,983 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 15 mm 187 mm 525 mm

It is not found anywhere that gets close to freezing. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 253 research-grade observations of Calliandra tergemina 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 49 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.

  • Acacia purpurea Steud.
  • Anneslia canescens (Cham. & Schltdl.) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia cruziana Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia deamii Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia emarginata (Humb. & Bonpl. ex Willd.) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia juchitana Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia langlassei (Harms) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia leucotricha Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia mexicana (Brandegee) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia purpusii (Brandegee) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia rupestris (Brandegee) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia seemannii (Benth.) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia sinaloana Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia tergemina (L.) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia tetraphylla (G.Don) Britton & Rose
  • Anneslia yucatanensis Britton & Rose
  • Calliandra canescens (Cham. & Schltdl.) Benth.
  • Calliandra cruziana (Britton & Rose) Standl.
  • Calliandra deamii (Britton & Rose) Standl.
  • Calliandra emarginata (Humb. & Bonpl. ex Willd.) Benth.
  • Calliandra langlassei Harms
  • Calliandra mexicana Brandegee
  • Calliandra purpusii Brandegee
  • Calliandra rupestris Brandegee

and 25 more.

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.