Floerkea proserpinacoidesWilld.

false mermaidfalse mermaidweed

WFO wfo-0000691417 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Daniel McClosky
fig. a Daniel McClosky, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-05-13 / obs. 197439396
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Peter Nathaniel Boyer
fig. b Peter Nathaniel Boyer, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 191358697
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Yann Kemper
fig. c Yann Kemper, CC0 1.0 / obs. 189556802
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Matt Schultz
fig. d Matt Schultz, CC0 1.0 / obs. 185545908
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by botanygirl
fig. e botanygirl, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 184267640
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. f Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 182171273
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Mason Heberling
fig. g Mason Heberling, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 180573887
Floerkea proserpinacoides, photographed by Yann Kemper
fig. h Yann Kemper, CC0 1.0 / obs. 123102701

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 36 botanical countries

Regions where Floerkea proserpinacoides is native: British Columbia, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Nova Scotia, Ohio, Ontario, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Québec, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming British ColumbiaCaliforniaColoradoConnecticutIdahoIllinoisIndianaIowaKentuckyLouisianaMarylandMassachusettsMichiganMinnesotaMissouriMontanaNevadaNew JerseyNew YorkNorth DakotaNova ScotiaOhioOntarioOregonPennsylvaniaQuébecTennesseeUtahVermontVirginiaWashingtonWest VirginiaWisconsinWyoming DelawareDistrict of Columbia
Native distribution of Floerkea proserpinacoides, 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
British Columbia BRC NORTHERN AMERICA
California CAL
Colorado COL
Connecticut CNT
Delaware DEL
District of Columbia WDC
Idaho IDA
Illinois ILL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kentucky KTY
Louisiana LOU
Maryland MRY
Massachusetts MAS
Michigan MIC
Minnesota MIN
Missouri MSO
Montana MNT
Nevada NEV
New Jersey NWJ
New York NWY
North Dakota NDA
Nova Scotia NSC
Ohio OHI
Ontario ONT
Oregon ORE
Pennsylvania PEN
Québec QUE
Tennessee TEN
Utah UTA
Vermont VER
Virginia VRG
Washington WAS
West Virginia WVA
Wisconsin WIS
Wyoming WYO

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 131 in flower of 341 examined

Peak flowering in May. Each bar is the share of Floerkea proserpinacoides 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. 131 of 341 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 8 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 6 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.

  • Cabomba pinnata (Pursh) Schult. & Schult.f.
  • Floerkea lacustris Pers.
  • Floerkea occidentalis Rydb.
  • Floerkea palustris Nutt.
  • Floerkea uliginosa Muhl.
  • Nectris pinnata Pursh

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.