Delphinium elatumL.

candle larkspur

WFO wfo-0000640017 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Delphinium elatum, photographed by Alexander Dubynin
fig. a Alexander Dubynin, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-09-12 / obs. 157088431
Delphinium elatum, photographed by Aleksei Baushev
fig. b Aleksei Baushev, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 158420161
Delphinium elatum, photographed by xulescu_g
fig. c xulescu_g, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 149449043
Delphinium elatum, photographed by Oleg Kosterin
fig. d Oleg Kosterin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 149783305
Delphinium elatum, photographed by Valentin Kosterin
fig. e Valentin Kosterin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 144146536
Delphinium elatum, photographed by Нурхайдарова Татьяна
fig. f Нурхайдарова Татьяна, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 86765242
Delphinium elatum, photographed by Марина Садыкова
fig. g Марина Садыкова, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 88154253
Delphinium elatum, photographed by Alexander Dubynin
fig. h Alexander Dubynin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 98867786

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 24 botanical countries

Regions where Delphinium elatum is native: Altay, Buryatiya, Irkutsk, Kazakhstan, Kirgizstan, Krasnoyarsk, Mongolia, Tuva, West Siberia, Xinjiang, Yakutiya, Austria, Belarus, Central European Russia, Czechia-Slovakia, East European Russia, France, North European Russia, NW. Balkan Pen., Poland, Romania, South European Russia, Switzerland, Ukraine AltayBuryatiyaIrkutskKazakhstanKirgizstanKrasnoyarskMongoliaTuvaWest SiberiaXinjiangYakutiyaAustriaBelarusCentral European RussiaCzechia-SlovakiaEast European RussiaFranceNorth European RussiaNW. Balkan Pen.PolandRomaniaSouth European RussiaSwitzerlandUkraine
Native distribution of Delphinium elatum, 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
Austria AUT EUROPE
Belarus BLR
Central European Russia RUC
Czechia-Slovakia CZE
East European Russia RUE
France FRA
North European Russia RUN
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Poland POL
Romania ROM
South European Russia RUS
Switzerland SWI
Ukraine UKR
Altay ALT ASIA-TEMPERATE
Buryatiya BRY
Irkutsk IRK
Kazakhstan KAZ
Kirgizstan KGZ
Krasnoyarsk KRA
Mongolia MON
Tuva TVA
West Siberia WSB
Xinjiang CHX
Yakutiya YAK

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.

Flowering 161 in flower of 172 examined

Peak flowering in Aug. Each bar is the share of Delphinium elatum observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 161 of 172 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 9 months have fewer than 5 examined observations, so no proportion is drawn for them. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 43 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.

  • Delphinastrum elatum (L.) Spach
  • Delphinastrum hybridum (L.) Spach
  • Delphinastrum urceolatum (Jacq.) Nieuwl.
  • Delphinium alopecuroides W.Bull ex K.Koch
  • Delphinium alpinum var. hebecarpum Kulikov
  • Delphinium atropurpureum Pall.
  • Delphinium belladonna (Kelw.) Bergmans
  • Delphinium clusianum Host
  • Delphinium cryophilum Nevski
  • Delphinium davuricum Georgi
  • Delphinium elatum f. grandiflorum Serg.
  • Delphinium elatum f. parviflorum Serg.
  • Delphinium elatum f. productum Serg.
  • Delphinium elatum subsp. bosniacum (Pawł.) Starm.
  • Delphinium elatum subsp. cryophilum (Nevski) Jurtzev
  • Delphinium elatum subsp. macrotepalum Starm.
  • Delphinium elatum subsp. pubicaule (Borbás) Dostál
  • Delphinium elatum subsp. tiroliense (A.Kern. ex Dalla Torre) Hegi
  • Delphinium elatum var. alpinum Serg.
  • Delphinium elatum var. belladonna Kelway
  • Delphinium elatum var. bosniacum Pawł.
  • Delphinium elatum var. giganteum Serg.
  • Delphinium elatum var. glabrum Serg.
  • Delphinium elatum var. gracile Serg.

and 19 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.