Senna racemosa(Mill.) H.S.Irwin & Barneby

limestone senna

WFO wfo-0000175338 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Senna racemosa, photographed by Juan Cruzado Cortés
fig. a Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2020-03-12 / obs. 64047904
Senna racemosa, photographed by Eric Knight
fig. b Eric Knight, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 63204866
Senna racemosa, photographed by Juan Cruzado Cortés
fig. c Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 62341562
Senna racemosa, photographed by Juan Cruzado Cortés
fig. d Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 62269570
Senna racemosa, photographed by Juan Cruzado Cortés
fig. e Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 62270440
Senna racemosa, photographed by Juan Cruzado Cortés
fig. f Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 58908796
Senna racemosa, photographed by Juan Cruzado Cortés
fig. g Juan Cruzado Cortés, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 58908501
Senna racemosa, photographed by adel-fridus
fig. h adel-fridus, CC0 1.0 / obs. 32761759

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 Senna racemosa is native: Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Belize, Costa Rica, Cuba, Honduras, Venezuela Mexico GulfMexico NortheastMexico SoutheastMexico SouthwestBelizeCosta RicaCubaHondurasVenezuela
Native distribution of Senna racemosa, 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
Belize BLZ SOUTHERN AMERICA
Costa Rica COS
Cuba CUB
Honduras HON
Venezuela VEN
Mexico Gulf MXG NORTHERN AMERICA
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Southeast MXT
Mexico Southwest MXS

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.

Where it actually grows measured, from 83 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 18.6 °C 19.2 °C 23.5 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 28.6 °C 34.1 °C 35.9 °C
Annual rainfall 962 mm 1,220 mm 1,409 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 63 mm 107 mm 161 mm

It is not found anywhere that gets close to freezing. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 83 research-grade observations of Senna racemosa 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 9 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.

  • Cassia ekmaniana Urb.
  • Cassia floribunda Griseb. ex Benth.
  • Cassia liebmannii Benth.
  • Cassia racemosa Mill.
  • Cowellocassia racemosa (Mill.) Pittier
  • Gaumerocassia ekmaniana (Urb.) Britton
  • Gaumerocassia ekmaniana (Urb.) Britton & Rose
  • Gaumerocassia liebmannii (Benth.) Britton
  • Gaumerocassia liebmannii (Benth.) Britton & Rose

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.