Lobelia cardinalisL.

cardinal flower

WFO wfo-0000814269 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h

Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Michelle W. （鍾偉瑋）
fig. a Michelle W. （鍾偉瑋）, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-10-15 / obs. 163939745
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Samuel A Schmid, PhD, PWS
fig. b Samuel A Schmid, PhD, PWS, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 164301347
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Lauren McLaurin
fig. c Lauren McLaurin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 167444406
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Michelle W. （鍾偉瑋）
fig. d Michelle W. （鍾偉瑋）, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 163922210
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Brian Finzel
fig. e Brian Finzel, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 173949880
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. f Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 159684124
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by pynklynx
fig. g pynklynx, CC0 1.0 / obs. 161173044
Lobelia cardinalis, photographed by Even Dankowicz
fig. h Even Dankowicz, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 167827385

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.

Flowering n = 7,546 observations

Peak flowering in Aug, from 7,546 community-annotated observations worldwide. This is a global aggregate, not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres, and citizen-science records cluster near cities, at weekends, and in spring. Where a species has fewer than 30 annotated records we do not draw this chart at all.

Also published as 77 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.

  • Dortmanna cardinalis (L.) Kuntze
  • Dortmanna cordigera (Cav.) Kuntze
  • Dortmanna engelmanniana Kuntze
  • Dortmanna fulgens (Willd.) Kuntze
  • Dortmanna graminea (Lam.) Kuntze
  • Dortmanna longifolia (C.Presl) Kuntze
  • Dortmanna phyllostachya Kuntze
  • Dortmanna splendens (Willd.) Kuntze
  • Lobelia cardinalis f. alba (J.McNab) H.St.John
  • Lobelia cardinalis f. cardinalis
  • Lobelia cardinalis f. cordigera (Cav.) Bowden
  • Lobelia cardinalis f. hispidula (E.Wimm.) Bowden
  • Lobelia cardinalis f. rosea H.St.John
  • Lobelia cardinalis f. splendens (Willd.) Bowden
  • Lobelia cardinalis subsp. cardinalis
  • Lobelia cardinalis subsp. graminea (Lam.) McVaugh
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. alba J.McNab
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. angustifolia Vatke
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. candida Alph.Wood
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. glandulosa N.Coleman
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. graminea (Lam.) McVaugh
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. hispidula E.Wimm.
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. integerrima Alph.Wood
  • Lobelia cardinalis var. meridionalis Bowden

and 53 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.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice, no toxicity claim and no native range, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.