Cenchrus biflorusRoxb.

Indian sandbur

WFO wfo-0000858562 Accepted WFO 2026-06 3 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–c · 3 separate observations

Cenchrus biflorus, photographed by Kym Nicolson
fig. a Kym Nicolson, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-01-31 / obs. 117452007
Cenchrus biflorus, photographed by i_c_riddell
fig. b i_c_riddell, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 997854
Cenchrus biflorus, photographed by i_c_riddell
fig. c i_c_riddell, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 5360568

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
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Accession
K001562398
Filed as
Cenchrus biflorus Roxb.
Det. by
Sosef, M.S.M.
Collected
Wieringa, J.J. 1990-05-19
Origin
GA
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 44 botanical countries

Regions where Cenchrus biflorus is native: Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Caprivi Strip, Chad, Congo, Djibouti, DR Congo, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Northern Provinces, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan-South Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Saudi Arabia, Sinai, Yemen, India, Pakistan, West Himalaya AlgeriaAngolaBeninBotswanaBurkinaBurundiCameroonCaprivi StripChadCongoDjiboutiDR CongoEgyptEquatorial GuineaEritreaEthiopiaGambiaGhanaGuineaGuinea-BissauIvory CoastKenyaMadagascarMaliMauritaniaMozambiqueNamibiaNigerNigeriaNorthern ProvincesSenegalSomaliaSudan-South SudanTanzaniaTogoZambiaZimbabweSaudi ArabiaSinaiYemenIndiaPakistanWest Himalaya Cape Verde
Native distribution of Cenchrus biflorus, 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
Algeria ALG AFRICA
Angola ANG
Benin BEN
Botswana BOT
Burkina BKN
Burundi BUR
Cameroon CMN
Cape Verde CVI
Caprivi Strip CPV
Chad CHA
Congo CON
Djibouti DJI
DR Congo ZAI
Egypt EGY
Equatorial Guinea EQG
Eritrea ERI
Ethiopia ETH
Gambia GAM
Ghana GHA
Guinea GUI
Guinea-Bissau GNB
Ivory Coast IVO
Kenya KEN
Madagascar MDG
Mali MLI
Mauritania MTN
Mozambique MOZ
Namibia NAM
Niger NGR
Nigeria NGA
Northern Provinces TVL
Senegal SEN
Somalia SOM
Sudan-South Sudan SUD
Tanzania TAN
Togo TOG
Zambia ZAM
Zimbabwe ZIM
Saudi Arabia SAU ASIA-TEMPERATE
Sinai SIN
Yemen YEM
India IND ASIA-TROPICAL
Pakistan PAK
West Himalaya WHM

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 32 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 8.0 °C 16.0 °C 23.1 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 29.0 °C 37.2 °C 41.3 °C
Annual rainfall 67 mm 605 mm 1,267 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 0 mm 4 mm 51 mm

It is barely found anywhere that freezes. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 32 research-grade observations of Cenchrus biflorus 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 10 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.

  • Cenchrus annularis Andersson
  • Cenchrus barbatus Schumach.
  • Cenchrus catharticus Delile
  • Cenchrus lapeta Ham. ex Stapf
  • Cenchrus leptacanthus A.Camus
  • Cenchrus niloticus Fig. & De Not.
  • Cenchrus perinvolucratus Stapf & C.E.Hubb.
  • Cenchrus rajasthanensis Kanodia & P.C.Nanda
  • Cenchrus triflorus Aitch.
  • Elymus caput-medusae Forssk.

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.