Vicia orobusDC.

Upright VetchWood Bitter-vetchupright vetchwood bitter-vetch

WFO wfo-0000214060 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 5 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 5 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Vicia orobus, photographed by José Luis Camaño
fig. a José Luis Camaño, CC0 1.0 / 2004-05-30 / obs. 149386397
Vicia orobus, photographed by José Luis Camaño
fig. b José Luis Camaño, CC0 1.0 / obs. 149386223
Vicia orobus, photographed by Michael D. Pirie
fig. c Michael D. Pirie, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 52716146
Vicia orobus, photographed by Dan Wrench
fig. d Dan Wrench, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 120636128
Vicia orobus, photographed by Dan Wrench
fig. e Dan Wrench, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 49681450
Vicia orobus, photographed by Michael D. Pirie
fig. f Michael D. Pirie, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 52716121
Vicia orobus, photographed by Dan Wrench
fig. g Dan Wrench, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 49681446
Vicia orobus, photographed by Morten DD Hansen
fig. h Morten DD Hansen, CC0 1.0 / obs. 41240042

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 10 botanical countries

Regions where Vicia orobus is native: Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland BelgiumDenmarkFranceGermanyIrelandNorwayPortugalSpainSwitzerland
Native distribution of Vicia orobus, 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
Belgium BGM EUROPE
Denmark DEN
France FRA
Germany GER
Great Britain GRB
Ireland IRE
Norway NOR
Portugal POR
Spain SPA
Switzerland SWI

Not drawn on the map: Great Britain. We hold no public-domain boundary for this region, so it is listed rather than guessed at.

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.

Also published as 8 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.

  • Ervum orobus (DC.) Kitt.
  • Orobus aristatus Lapeyr.
  • Orobus sylvaticus L.
  • Orobus sylvaticus var. simplicifolius Gray
  • Vicia aristata Dulac
  • Vicia cassubica subsp. orobus (DC.) Bonnier & Layens
  • Vicia cassubica var. orobus (DC.) Dumort.
  • Vicilla orobus (DC.) Schur

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.