Phaseolus coccineusL.

scarlet runner

WFO wfo-0000183242 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by Sue Carnahan
fig. a Sue Carnahan, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-01-21 / obs. 177973687
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by Alexis López Hernández
fig. b Alexis López Hernández, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160622849
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by Daniel Mesa
fig. c Daniel Mesa, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 159243947
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by Zazil Dellamary
fig. d Zazil Dellamary, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 99531865
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by Diana Fuentes
fig. e Diana Fuentes, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 76822868
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by alejandrozab
fig. f alejandrozab, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 59220706
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by José Belem Hernández Díaz
fig. g José Belem Hernández Díaz, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 50259893
Phaseolus coccineus, photographed by ELOYJIMENEZ13
fig. h ELOYJIMENEZ13, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 49759189

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 9 botanical countries

Regions where Phaseolus coccineus is native: Mexico Central, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua Mexico CentralMexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico NorthwestMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestGuatemalaHondurasNicaragua
Native distribution of Phaseolus coccineus, 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.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Mexico Central MXC NORTHERN AMERICA
Mexico Gulf MXG
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Northwest MXN
Mexico Southeast MXT
Mexico Southwest MXS
Guatemala GUA SOUTHERN AMERICA
Honduras HON
Nicaragua NIC

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 90 in flower of 98 examined

Peak flowering in Aug. Each bar is the share of Phaseolus coccineus 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. 90 of 98 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 5 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 50 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.

  • Lipusa formosa (Kunth) Alef.
  • Lipusa multiflora Alef.
  • Lipusa multiflora var. alba Alef.
  • Lipusa multiflora var. bicolor (Vell.) Alef.
  • Lipusa multiflora var. coccinea (L.) Alef.
  • Lipusa multiflora var. lucida Alef.
  • Lipusa multiflora var. niger (G.Martens) Alef.
  • Phaseolus bicolor Bailly
  • Phaseolus bicolor Vell.
  • Phaseolus coccineus Moc. & Sessé ex G.Don
  • Phaseolus coccineus subsp. coccineus
  • Phaseolus coccineus subsp. formosus (Kunth) Maréchal, Mascherpa & Stainier
  • Phaseolus coccineus subsp. obvallatus (Schltdl.) Maréchal, Mascherpa & Stainier
  • Phaseolus coccineus subsp. striatus (Brandegee) Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. argenteus Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. coccineus
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. condensatus Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. griseus (Piper) Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. guatemalensis Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. lineatibracteolatus Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. minuticicatricatus Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. parvibracteolatus Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. pringlei Rose ex Freytag
  • Phaseolus coccineus var. pubescens Freytag

and 26 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.