Holosteum umbellatumL.

jagged chickweedumbellate chickweed

WFO wfo-0000724345 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Holosteum umbellatum, photographed by Aleksei Baushev
fig. a Aleksei Baushev, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-05-06 / obs. 196332975

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
The New York Botanical Garden
Accession
446376
Filed as
Holosteum umbellatum L.
Det. by
M. T. Hysell
Collected
M. T. Hysell 1993-04-19
Origin
US
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 56 botanical countries

Regions where Holosteum umbellatum is native: Algeria, Ethiopia, Morocco, Tunisia, Afghanistan, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kirgizstan, Lebanon-Syria, North Caucasus, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Sinai, Tadzhikistan, Transcaucasus, Türkiye, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Xinjiang, Pakistan, West Himalaya, Albania, Austria, Baltic States, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Central European Russia, Corse, Czechia-Slovakia, Denmark, East European Russia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Kriti, Krym, Netherlands, NW. Balkan Pen., Poland, Portugal, Romania, Sardegna, Sicilia, South European Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye-in-Europe, Ukraine AlgeriaEthiopiaMoroccoTunisiaAfghanistanCyprusEast Aegean Is.IranIraqKazakhstanKirgizstanLebanon-SyriaNorth CaucasusOmanPalestineSaudi ArabiaSinaiTadzhikistanTranscaucasusTürkiyeTurkmenistanUzbekistanXinjiangPakistanWest HimalayaAlbaniaAustriaBaltic StatesBelarusBelgiumBulgariaCentral European RussiaCorseCzechia-SlovakiaDenmarkEast European RussiaFranceGermanyGreeceHungaryItalyKritiKrymNetherlandsNW. Balkan Pen.PolandPortugalRomaniaSiciliaSouth European RussiaSpainSwedenSwitzerlandTürkiye-in-EuropeUkraine Sardegna
Native distribution of Holosteum umbellatum, 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
Albania ALB EUROPE
Austria AUT
Baltic States BLT
Belarus BLR
Belgium BGM
Bulgaria BUL
Central European Russia RUC
Corse COR
Czechia-Slovakia CZE
Denmark DEN
East European Russia RUE
France FRA
Germany GER
Greece GRC
Hungary HUN
Italy ITA
Kriti KRI
Krym KRY
Netherlands NET
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Poland POL
Portugal POR
Romania ROM
Sardegna SAR
Sicilia SIC
South European Russia RUS
Spain SPA
Sweden SWE
Switzerland SWI
Türkiye-in-Europe TUE
Ukraine UKR
Afghanistan AFG ASIA-TEMPERATE
Cyprus CYP
East Aegean Is. EAI
Iran IRN
Iraq IRQ
Kazakhstan KAZ
Kirgizstan KGZ
Lebanon-Syria LBS
North Caucasus NCS
Oman OMA
Palestine PAL
Saudi Arabia SAU
Sinai SIN
Tadzhikistan TZK
Transcaucasus TCS
Türkiye TUR
Turkmenistan TKM
Uzbekistan UZB
Xinjiang CHX
Algeria ALG AFRICA
Ethiopia ETH
Morocco MOR
Tunisia TUN
Pakistan PAK ASIA-TROPICAL
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.

Flowering 248 in flower of 412 examined

Proportion of examined Holosteum umbellatum in flower, by month
Month In flower Examined Share 95% interval
Jan 0 0 too few examined
Feb 4 11 36% 15% to 65%
Mar 124 170 73% 66% to 79%
Apr 102 199 51% 44% to 58%
May 18 31 58% 41% to 74%
Jun 0 0 too few examined
Jul 0 0 too few examined
Aug 0 0 too few examined
Sep 0 0 too few examined
Oct 0 0 too few examined
Nov 0 1 too few examined
Dec 0 0 too few examined

Peak flowering in Mar. Each bar is the share of Holosteum umbellatum 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. 248 of 412 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.

Where it actually grows measured, from 2,037 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -9.1 °C -3.9 °C 0.5 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 23.0 °C 26.3 °C 32.0 °C
Annual rainfall 309 mm 597 mm 1,165 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 37 mm 106 mm 249 mm

It is found where winters bring hard 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 2,037 research-grade observations of Holosteum umbellatum 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. Climate from CHELSA V2.1 (Karger et al. 2017); occurrences from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 12 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.

  • Alsine umbellata (L.) Lam.
  • Arenaria umbellata [Clairv.]
  • Cerastium murale Salisb.
  • Cerastium umbellatum (L.) Crantz
  • Holosteum syvaschicum Kleopow
  • Holosteum umbellatum f. glaberrimum (Strobl) F.Dvořák
  • Holosteum umbellatum subsp. umbellatum
  • Holosteum umbellatum subsp. viscosissimum (Čelak.) F.Dvořák
  • Holosteum umbellatum var. glaberrimum Strobl
  • Holosteum umbellatum var. oligandrum Fenzl
  • Holosteum umbellatum var. umbellatum
  • Holosteum umbellatum var. viscosissimum Čelak.

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.