Ranunculus fascicularisMuhl. ex Bigelow

early buttercup

WFO wfo-0001129256 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Ethan Rose
fig. a Ethan Rose, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-06-10 / obs. 205024482
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. b Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 200171623
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Susan Berry
fig. c Susan Berry, CC0 1.0 / obs. 200810850
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. d Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 197628411
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Liren Varghese
fig. e Liren Varghese, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 197144484
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Tom Lazar
fig. f Tom Lazar, CC0 1.0 / obs. 200870028
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Andrea Wallace
fig. g Andrea Wallace, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 192518985
Ranunculus fascicularis, photographed by Craig Martin
fig. h Craig Martin, CC0 1.0 / obs. 191895760

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 31 botanical countries

Regions where Ranunculus fascicularis is native: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Manitoba, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Wisconsin AlabamaArkansasConnecticutGeorgiaIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaManitobaMarylandMassachusettsMichiganMinnesotaMississippiMissouriNebraskaNew JerseyNew YorkNorth CarolinaOhioOklahomaOntarioPennsylvaniaSouth CarolinaTennesseeTexasVirginiaWisconsin Rhode I.
Native distribution of Ranunculus fascicularis, 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
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
Arkansas ARK
Connecticut CNT
Georgia GEO
Illinois ILL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kansas KAN
Kentucky KTY
Louisiana LOU
Manitoba MAN
Maryland MRY
Massachusetts MAS
Michigan MIC
Minnesota MIN
Mississippi MSI
Missouri MSO
Nebraska NEB
New Jersey NWJ
New York NWY
North Carolina NCA
Ohio OHI
Oklahoma OKL
Ontario ONT
Pennsylvania PEN
Rhode I. RHO
South Carolina SCA
Tennessee TEN
Texas TEX
Virginia VRG
Wisconsin WIS

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 382 in flower of 405 examined

Peak flowering in Apr. Each bar is the share of Ranunculus fascicularis 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. 382 of 405 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 7 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 4 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.

  • Ranunculus apricus Greene
  • Ranunculus fascicularis var. apricus (Greene) Fernald
  • Ranunculus fascicularis var. fascicularis
  • Ranunculus illinoensis Greene

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.