Sagittaria trifoliaL.

threeleaf arrowhead

WFO wfo-0000738042 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by chiuluan
fig. a chiuluan, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-05-21 / obs. 199325203
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by chiuluan
fig. b chiuluan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 199428370
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by chiuluan
fig. c chiuluan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 199428557
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by chiuluan
fig. d chiuluan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 198152112
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by Jacy Chen
fig. e Jacy Chen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 154915853
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by 葉子
fig. f 葉子, CC0 1.0 / obs. 108604097
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by Oleg Kosterin
fig. g Oleg Kosterin, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 97229573
Sagittaria trifolia, photographed by Atousa Farahpour-Haghani
fig. h Atousa Farahpour-Haghani, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 73555218

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
4281687
Filed as
Sagittaria trifolia L.
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. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. 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 herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 43 botanical countries

Regions where Sagittaria trifolia is native: Afghanistan, Amur, Buryatiya, China North-Central, China South-Central, China Southeast, Chita, Hainan, Inner Mongolia, Iran, Iraq, Japan, Kazakhstan, Khabarovsk, Kirgizstan, Korea, Krasnoyarsk, Manchuria, Nansei-shoto, North Caucasus, Primorye, Tadzhikistan, Taiwan, Transcaucasus, Uzbekistan, Assam, Bangladesh, Cambodia, East Himalaya, India, Laos, Malaya, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicobar Is., Pakistan, Philippines, Sulawesi, Sumatera, Thailand, Vietnam, West Himalaya, South European Russia AfghanistanAmurBuryatiyaChina North-CentralChina South-CentralChina SoutheastChitaHainanInner MongoliaIranIraqJapanKazakhstanKhabarovskKirgizstanKrasnoyarskManchuriaNorth CaucasusPrimoryeTadzhikistanTaiwanTranscaucasusUzbekistanAssamBangladeshCambodiaEast HimalayaIndiaLaosMalayaMyanmarNepalPakistanPhilippinesSulawesiSumateraThailandVietnamWest HimalayaSouth European Russia KoreaNansei-shotoNicobar Is.
Native distribution of Sagittaria trifolia, 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
Afghanistan AFG ASIA-TEMPERATE
Amur AMU
Buryatiya BRY
China North-Central CHN
China South-Central CHC
China Southeast CHS
Chita CTA
Hainan CHH
Inner Mongolia CHI
Iran IRN
Iraq IRQ
Japan JAP
Kazakhstan KAZ
Khabarovsk KHA
Kirgizstan KGZ
Korea KOR
Krasnoyarsk KRA
Manchuria CHM
Nansei-shoto NNS
North Caucasus NCS
Primorye PRM
Tadzhikistan TZK
Taiwan TAI
Transcaucasus TCS
Uzbekistan UZB
Assam ASS ASIA-TROPICAL
Bangladesh BAN
Cambodia CBD
East Himalaya EHM
India IND
Laos LAO
Malaya MLY
Myanmar MYA
Nepal NEP
Nicobar Is. NCB
Pakistan PAK
Philippines PHI
Sulawesi SUL
Sumatera SUM
Thailand THA
Vietnam VIE
West Himalaya WHM
South European Russia RUS EUROPE

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 82 in flower of 92 examined

Peak flowering in Jun. Each bar is the share of Sagittaria trifolia 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. 82 of 92 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.

Where it actually grows measured, from 327 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -19.3 °C 9.5 °C 15.2 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 24.9 °C 29.4 °C 31.9 °C
Annual rainfall 450 mm 1,998 mm 4,373 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 10 mm 182 mm 820 mm

It is found where winters are severely cold. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 327 research-grade observations of Sagittaria trifolia 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. Climate from CHELSA V2.1 (Karger et al. 2017); occurrences from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 40 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.

  • Sagittaria chinensis Sims
  • Sagittaria doniana Sweet
  • Sagittaria hastata D.Don
  • Sagittaria hirundinacea Blume
  • Sagittaria japonica hort. ex E.Vilm.
  • Sagittaria leucopetala (Miq.) Bergmans
  • Sagittaria macrophylla Bunge
  • Sagittaria obtusa Thunb.
  • Sagittaria sagittata Thunb.
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia f. coerulea Makino
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia f. longiloba (Turcz.) Regel
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia f. sinensis (Sims) Makino
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia f. subaequiloba Regel
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia subsp. leucopetala (Miq.) Hartog
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. alismifolia Makino
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. angustifolia Siebold
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. diversifolia M.Michel
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. edulis Siebold ex Miq.
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. leucopetala Miq.
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. longiloba Turcz.
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. sinensis (Sims) Makino
  • Sagittaria sagittifolia var. subaequilonga Regel
  • Sagittaria sinensis Sims
  • Sagittaria trifolia f. albida Makino

and 16 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.