Nuphar pumila(Timm) DC.

Least Water-lily

WFO wfo-0000381456 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Nuphar pumila, photographed by Oleg Kosterin
fig. a Oleg Kosterin, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-08-15 / obs. 151380046

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
04418298
Filed as
Nuphar pumila (Timm) DC.
Det. by
not recorded on this sheet
Collected
not recorded
Origin
not recorded
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. We link to the digitised sheet rather than rehosting it, because the holding institutions do not serve their images to third parties reliably and we are not going to show you a picture we cannot actually deliver. 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 sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 45 botanical countries

Regions where Nuphar pumila is native: Altay, Amur, China North-Central, China South-Central, China Southeast, Chita, Inner Mongolia, Irkutsk, Japan, Kamchatka, Kazakhstan, Khabarovsk, Korea, Krasnoyarsk, Kuril Is., Magadan, Manchuria, Mongolia, Primorye, Sakhalin, Taiwan, West Siberia, Xinjiang, Yakutiya, Albania, Austria, Baltic States, Belarus, Central European Russia, Czechia-Slovakia, Denmark, East European Russia, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, North European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Norway, NW. Balkan Pen., Poland, South European Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland AltayAmurChina North-CentralChina South-CentralChina SoutheastChitaInner MongoliaIrkutskJapanKamchatkaKazakhstanKhabarovskKrasnoyarskMagadanManchuriaMongoliaPrimoryeSakhalinTaiwanWest SiberiaXinjiangYakutiyaAlbaniaAustriaBaltic StatesBelarusCentral European RussiaCzechia-SlovakiaDenmarkEast European RussiaFinlandFranceGermanyNorth European RussiaNorthwest European RussiaNorwayNW. Balkan Pen.PolandSouth European RussiaSpainSwedenSwitzerland Korea
Native distribution of Nuphar pumila, 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
Altay ALT ASIA-TEMPERATE
Amur AMU
China North-Central CHN
China South-Central CHC
China Southeast CHS
Chita CTA
Inner Mongolia CHI
Irkutsk IRK
Japan JAP
Kamchatka KAM
Kazakhstan KAZ
Khabarovsk KHA
Korea KOR
Krasnoyarsk KRA
Kuril Is. KUR
Magadan MAG
Manchuria CHM
Mongolia MON
Primorye PRM
Sakhalin SAK
Taiwan TAI
West Siberia WSB
Xinjiang CHX
Yakutiya YAK
Albania ALB EUROPE
Austria AUT
Baltic States BLT
Belarus BLR
Central European Russia RUC
Czechia-Slovakia CZE
Denmark DEN
East European Russia RUE
Finland FIN
France FRA
Germany GER
Great Britain GRB
North European Russia RUN
Northwest European Russia RUW
Norway NOR
NW. Balkan Pen. YUG
Poland POL
South European Russia RUS
Spain SPA
Sweden SWE
Switzerland SWI

Not drawn on the map: Kuril Is., Great Britain. We hold no public-domain boundary for these regions, so they are listed rather than guessed at.

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 211 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -25.6 °C -12.3 °C 12.6 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 17.3 °C 22.1 °C 30.7 °C
Annual rainfall 473 mm 698 mm 2,567 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 30 mm 108 mm 315 mm

It is found where winters are arctic. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 211 research-grade observations of Nuphar pumila 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.

  • Nenuphar pumila Bluff & Fingh.
  • Nuphar bornetii H.Lév. & Vaniot
  • Nuphar centricavata Schuster
  • Nuphar jurana Magnin
  • Nuphar lapponica Laest.
  • Nuphar lutea subsp. pumila (Timm) E.O.Beal
  • Nuphar lutea subsp. pumila (Timm) Bonnier & Layens
  • Nuphar lutea var. minor (Dumort.) Lej. & Courtois
  • Nuphar lutea var. pumila (Timm) A.Gray
  • Nuphar minor Dumort.
  • Nuphar ozeensis Miki
  • Nuphar pumila f. rubro-ovaria Koji Ito ex Hideki Takah., M.Yamaz. & J.Sasaki
  • Nuphar pumila var. hookeri Harz
  • Nuphar pumila var. ozeensis (Miki) H.Hara
  • Nuphar pumila var. stellatifidum J.Schust.
  • Nuphar pumila var. timmii Harz
  • Nuphar shimadai Hayata
  • Nuphar sinensis Hand.-Mazz.
  • Nuphar subpumila Miki
  • Nymphaea lutea subsp. pumila (Timm) Bonnier & Layens
  • Nymphaea lutea var. pumila Timm
  • Nymphaea pumila Hoffm.
  • Nymphaea pumila f. glabrata J.Schust.
  • Nymphaea pumila f. sericotricha J.Schust.

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.