Orthotrichum cupulatumHoffm. ex Brid.

orthotrichum moss

WFO wfo-0001195023 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 7 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 7 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Orthotrichum cupulatum, photographed by Christian Berg
fig. a Christian Berg, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-05-01 / obs. 195027927

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.

Where it actually grows measured, from 92 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -7.9 °C -1.6 °C 2.8 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 15.7 °C 21.6 °C 26.1 °C
Annual rainfall 575 mm 861 mm 2,439 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 88 mm 156 mm 375 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 92 research-grade observations of Orthotrichum cupulatum 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 Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.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 91 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.

  • Brachytrichum cupulatum (Hoffm. ex Brid.) Röhl.
  • Brachytrichum subulatum Röhl. ex Wijk, Margad. & Florsch.
  • Bryum sessile With.
  • Dorcadion cupulatum (Hoffm. ex Brid.) Lindb.
  • Orthotrichum abbreviatum Grönvall
  • Orthotrichum anomalum subsp. nudum (Dicks.) J.J.Amann
  • Orthotrichum anomalum var. cryptopodium Huebener
  • Orthotrichum anomalum var. cupulatum (Hoffm. ex Brid.) Wahlenb.
  • Orthotrichum anomalum var. floerkeanum Hampe
  • Orthotrichum austrocupulatum Dixon & Sainsbury
  • Orthotrichum baldaccii Bott. & Venturi
  • Orthotrichum calcareum R.Br.bis
  • Orthotrichum calcareum (Venturi) Venturi
  • Orthotrichum commutatum Bruch
  • Orthotrichum confertum Bruch
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. calvum (Latzel) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. fenestratum (Herzog) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. fenestratum (Velen.) Laz.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. longifolium (Limpr.) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. macrocarpum (Warnst.) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. mucronatum (Venturi) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. norvegicum (I.Hagen) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. octostriatum (Limpr.) Podp.
  • Orthotrichum cupulatum f. rudolphianum Podp.

and 67 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.

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. It has no native range either: Kew's checklist does not cover this taxon.