Calluna vulgaris(L.) Hill

common heather

WFO wfo-0000580837 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h

Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Tony Rebelo
fig. a Tony Rebelo, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2017-06-21 / obs. 31098551
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Łucja Borsuk
fig. b Łucja Borsuk, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 203830354
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by ahabo
fig. c ahabo, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 204930702
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Alexis Tinker-Tsavalas
fig. d Alexis Tinker-Tsavalas, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205480773
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Jason Grant
fig. e Jason Grant, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205229693
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Quentin Groom
fig. f Quentin Groom, CC0 1.0 / obs. 203786448
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Pavel Kacl
fig. g Pavel Kacl, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205553255
Calluna vulgaris, photographed by Pavel Kacl
fig. h Pavel Kacl, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 205558511

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.

Flowering n = 3,349 observations

Peak flowering in Aug, from 3,349 community-annotated observations worldwide. This is a global aggregate, not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres, and citizen-science records cluster near cities, at weekends, and in spring. Where a species has fewer than 30 annotated records we do not draw this chart at all.

Also published as 33 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.

  • Calluna atlantica Seem.
  • Calluna beleziana Rouy
  • Calluna ciliaris Schur
  • Calluna elegantissima Sennen
  • Calluna erica DC.
  • Calluna genuina Ducommun
  • Calluna sagittifolia (Stokes) Gray
  • Calluna vulgaris f. alba (Weston) Braun-Blanq.
  • Calluna vulgaris f. purpurea (G.Don) Braun-Blanq.
  • Calluna vulgaris subsp. elegantissima (Sennen) Mateo
  • Calluna vulgaris var. alba (Weston) G.Don
  • Calluna vulgaris var. purpurea G.Don
  • Erica alportii K.Koch
  • Erica ciliaris Huds.
  • Erica confusa Gand.
  • Erica eremocharis Gand.
  • Erica glabra Gilib.
  • Erica gracilis K.Koch
  • Erica herbacea Georgi
  • Erica lutescens K.Koch
  • Erica nana K.Koch
  • Erica prostrata K.Koch
  • Erica reginae K.Koch
  • Erica sagittifolia Stokes

and 9 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.

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