Robinia hispida (Bristly Locust)

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Robinia hispida, photographed by Annie Weissman — fig. a Annie Weissman, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-06-09 / obs. 204719970

Robinia hispida, photographed by Michael J. Papay — fig. b Michael J. Papay, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 166013898

Robinia hispida, photographed by Chase Mathey — fig. c Chase Mathey, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 160766417

Robinia hispida, photographed by Lynn Harper — fig. d Lynn Harper, CC0 1.0 / obs. 138863067

Robinia hispida, photographed by Hill Craddock — fig. e Hill Craddock, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 131893451

Robinia hispida, photographed by Lucian Vazquez — fig. f Lucian Vazquez, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 131417756

Robinia hispida, photographed by Diane — fig. g Diane, CC0 1.0 / obs. 130525290

Robinia hispida, photographed by Jason K. — fig. h Jason K., CC BY 4.0 / obs. 164587845

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 6 botanical countries

Native distribution of Robinia hispida, 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.

Region	TDWG code	Continent
Alabama	ALA	NORTHERN AMERICA
Georgia	GEO
North Carolina	NCA
South Carolina	SCA
Tennessee	TEN
Virginia	VRG

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 385 in flower of 493 examined

93%

91%

87%

50%

28%

18%

13%

14%

Proportion of examined Robinia hispida in flower, by month
Month	In flower	Examined	Share	95% interval
Jan	0	3	too few examined
Feb	0	4	too few examined
Mar	0	1	too few examined
Apr	92	99	93%	86% to 97%
May	154	169	91%	86% to 95%
Jun	110	126	87%	80% to 92%
Jul	18	36	50%	34% to 66%
Aug	7	25	28%	14% to 48%
Sep	2	11	18%	5% to 48%
Oct	1	8	13%	2% to 47%
Nov	1	7	14%	3% to 51%
Dec	0	4	too few examined

Peak flowering in Apr. Each bar is the share of Robinia hispida 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. 385 of 493 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 4 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 33 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.

Aeschynomene hispida Roxb. ex Steud.
Pseudo-acacia hispida (L.) Moench
Robinia albicans Ashe
Robinia boyntonii Ashe
Robinia complexa K.Koch
Robinia elliottii (Chapm.) Ashe
Robinia fertilis Ashe
Robinia glabrescens Hoffmanns.
Robinia hirsuta Lindem.
Robinia hispida f. macrophylla (DC.) Voss
Robinia hispida f. rosea (Pursh) Voss
Robinia hispida var. boyntonii Ashe
Robinia hispida var. elliottii Chapm.
Robinia hispida var. fertilis (Ashe) R.T.Clausen
Robinia hispida var. hispida
Robinia hispida var. inermis G.Kirchn.
Robinia hispida var. kelseyi (Cowell ex Hutch.) Isely
Robinia hispida var. macrophylla DC.
Robinia hispida var. nana (Elliott) DC.
Robinia hispida var. rosea Pursh
Robinia hispida var. typica R.T.Clausen
Robinia kelseyi Cowell ex Hutch.
Robinia leucantha Rehder
Robinia macrophylla (DC.) Schrad. ex G.Don

and 9 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
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.