Cymbopogon nardus(L.) Rendle

citronella grass

WFO wfo-0000861056 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 7 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 7 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.

Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by 葉子
fig. a 葉子, CC0 1.0 / 2020-07-20 / obs. 86508202
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by 葉子
fig. b 葉子, CC0 1.0 / obs. 74968054
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by Tony Rebelo
fig. c Tony Rebelo, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 64313412
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by Tony Rebelo
fig. d Tony Rebelo, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 64326381
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by Tony Rebelo
fig. e Tony Rebelo, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 35285267
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by grabbarg
fig. f grabbarg, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 127145974
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by bat (Maria Vorontsova)
fig. g bat (Maria Vorontsova), CC0 1.0 / obs. 105540705
Cymbopogon nardus, photographed by Tony Rebelo
fig. h Tony Rebelo, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 35285323

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 29 botanical countries

Regions where Cymbopogon nardus is native: Angola, Botswana, Burundi, Cape Provinces, DR Congo, Eswatini, Free State, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Lesotho, Madagascar, Mozambique, Northern Provinces, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sudan-South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Assam, Bangladesh, Cambodia, East Himalaya, India, Laos, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, West Himalaya AngolaBotswanaBurundiCape ProvincesDR CongoEswatiniFree StateKenyaKwaZulu-NatalLesothoMadagascarMozambiqueNorthern ProvincesRwandaSudan-South SudanTanzaniaUgandaZimbabweAssamBangladeshCambodiaEast HimalayaIndiaLaosMyanmarSri LankaVietnamWest Himalaya Seychelles
Native distribution of Cymbopogon nardus, 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
Angola ANG AFRICA
Botswana BOT
Burundi BUR
Cape Provinces CPP
DR Congo ZAI
Eswatini SWZ
Free State OFS
Kenya KEN
KwaZulu-Natal NAT
Lesotho LES
Madagascar MDG
Mozambique MOZ
Northern Provinces TVL
Rwanda RWA
Seychelles SEY
Sudan-South Sudan SUD
Tanzania TAN
Uganda UGA
Zimbabwe ZIM
Assam ASS ASIA-TROPICAL
Bangladesh BAN
Cambodia CBD
East Himalaya EHM
India IND
Laos LAO
Myanmar MYA
Sri Lanka SRL
Vietnam VIE
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 109 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -0.3 °C 11.2 °C 24.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 23.2 °C 26.5 °C 30.4 °C
Annual rainfall 666 mm 1,024 mm 2,442 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 28 mm 94 mm 267 mm

It is found where winters bring light frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 109 research-grade observations of Cymbopogon nardus 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 30 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.

  • Andropogon citrosus Steud.
  • Andropogon confertiflorus Steud.
  • Andropogon grandis Nees ex Steud.
  • Andropogon hamulatus Nees ex Steud.
  • Andropogon nardus L.
  • Andropogon nardus subsp. grandis (Nees ex Steud.) Hack.
  • Andropogon nardus subsp. nilagiricus Hack.
  • Andropogon nardus var. confertiflorus (Steud.) Stapf ex Bor
  • Andropogon nardus var. luridus Hook.f.
  • Andropogon nardus var. prolixus Stapf
  • Andropogon nardus var. validus Stapf
  • Andropogon nardus var. zeyheri Hack.
  • Andropogon nilagiricus Hochst.
  • Andropogon nilagiricus Hochst. ex Hack.
  • Andropogon pseudohirtus Steud.
  • Andropogon thwaitesii Hook.f.
  • Cymbopogon afronardus Stapf
  • Cymbopogon claessensii Robyns
  • Cymbopogon confertiflorus (Steud.) Stapf
  • Cymbopogon nardus subsp. nilgiricus Hack.
  • Cymbopogon nardus var. confertiflorus (Steud.) Bor
  • Cymbopogon nardus var. luridus (Hook.f.) N.Rama Rao
  • Cymbopogon nardus var. nardus
  • Cymbopogon prolixus (Stapf) E.Phillips

and 6 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. 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.