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Abies guatemalensis; photograph (c) Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-03-10

Abies guatemalensis Rehder

Guatemalan fir; Pinabete

Pinaceae · Mexico Northeast, Mexico Southwest +4

Cited as Kew's World Checklist cites it, Abies guatemalensis Rehder: GBIF's backbone key for this page carries the name with another author, Rehd.

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Abies guatemalensis, photograph (c) Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, some rights reserved (CC BY)Abies guatemalensis, photograph (c) Liliana Ramírez-Freire, some rights reserved (CC BY)Abies guatemalensis, photograph (c) Liliana Ramírez-Freire, some rights reserved (CC BY)Abies guatemalensis, photograph (c) Laurel Meredyk, some rights reserved (CC BY)Abies guatemalensis, photograph (c) Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, some rights reserved (CC BY)Abies guatemalensis, photograph (c) Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, some rights reserved (CC BY) 50 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Coldest month, mean nightly low
7.0°C
Jan at the habitat, not a floor; extremes not used (the weather cell's ground is too far off) CHELSA
Warmest month, mean daily high
24°C
Apr and May at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,470mm
8 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
30–47DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in your months, northern hemisphere
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
Wet summers: the rain comes June to September, read as a summer growing season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Abies guatemalensis, the Guatemalan fir or pinabete, is an evergreen tree native to Central America and is the southernmost member of the genus Abies being spread to the south lower than 14° N. Its range is from southern (less from western and central) Mexico in the north to Honduras and El Salvador in the south. It is a warm-loving and moisture-loving tree of the tropical mountain coniferous and mixed cloud forests of these countries. The Guatemalan fir is an almost completely non-frost-resistant tree. Due to logging and loss of habitat, the tree is considered threatened and is protected in CITES Appendix I.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Abies guatemalensis", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,086 mm of 1,408 mm) falls in June to September, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 16.5 °C against a yearly mean of 15.5 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: December to March.

Rain

1,408 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,086 mm of it June to September. Wettest month July at 288 mm, driest month March at 11 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 886 mm to 2,303 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,470 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,408 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 30 to 47 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 24, the highest 90th-percentile month 48).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 7.0 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range 4.1 °C to 11.7 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 24.4 °C in April and May (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is 7.0 °C, the coldest month's mean nightly low, January, in the median year (CHELSA); a month's mean of its nightly lows is warmer than the nights a floor is read from. The daily extremes were read at a weather cell whose ground is too far above or below the typical spot to correct for, and are not used.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 50 to 69% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. No cold floor is read without a daily extremes series; the coldest month's mean nightly low named in its sentence is not one. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Abies guatemalensis through the yearWarmest months April and May, mean daily high 24 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low 7.0 °C; 1,408 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.0°5°10°15°20°25°30°35°°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 30–47RH 50–69%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 154 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C19 / 15–2421 / 17–2623 / 19–2824 / 20–3024 / 20–3022 / 18–2821 / 17–2721 / 17–2620 / 17–2620 / 16–2620 / 16–2519 / 16–24
Night °C7 / 4–128 / 5–138 / 6–1410 / 7–1612 / 9–1812 / 10–1912 / 9–1812 / 9–1812 / 9–1811 / 8–179 / 6–158 / 5–12
Rain mm27 / 11–4319 / 12–3011 / 6–4020 / 4–7969 / 21–192241 / 143–367288 / 172–419280 / 157–417277 / 174–436128 / 72–24130 / 17–8118 / 8–46
DLI32 / 25–3637 / 29–4043 / 35–4647 / 39–4844 / 38–4735 / 31–4034 / 29–4034 / 29–4030 / 26–3531 / 29–3432 / 27–3530 / 24–34
RH %54 / 48–6252 / 46–6150 / 43–5950 / 43–6057 / 49–6566 / 62–6967 / 63–6967 / 63–7069 / 65–7164 / 60–6958 / 53–6455 / 50–62

The daily extremes were not used: the correction for elevation, +1107 m, is beyond the 1,000 m either way that a lapse rate is applied over, so the weather cell's ground is other terrain than the typical spot's. So no cold floor is read for this species, and the coldest month's mean nightly low is not taken as one. What that cell gave, so corrected, over 44 years: absolute minimum 1.5 °C, 1st-percentile night 4.9 °C.

How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 154 grid cells holding the 250 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 1409:1515 (19.525, -104.225). Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 154 distinct grid cells holding 250 of the 250 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1409:1515 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 19.50_-104.375, lapse-corrected +1107 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1844 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeMexico Northeast, Mexico Southwest, Mexico Southeast, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker20.67, -104.872 · in the densest population, 248 records (64% of those in range)
Kew's description“tree” · “subtropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 390 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 250 of them placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 280 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 3 km away. 1 record outside the WCVP native range not used. 140 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 4° block of the 390 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Abies guatemalensis, photograph 1did not loadAbies guatemalensis, photograph 2did not loadAbies guatemalensis, photograph 3did not loadAbies guatemalensis, photograph 4did not loadAbies guatemalensis, photograph 5did not loadAbies guatemalensis, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Liliana Ramírez-Freire, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Laurel Meredyk, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Fuchsia arborescens Fuchsia arborescens Aretillo Photo: CC BY, Vítor JorgeRumfordia floribunda Rumfordia floribunda Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Ricardo Betancourt SánchezSolanum appendiculatum Solanum appendiculatum Solanaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedCrusea coccinea Crusea coccinea Rubiaceae Photo: CC BY, Trevor Van LoonSalvia lavanduloides Salvia lavanduloides Lavender Leaf Sage Photo: CC BY, Hugo JuárezDisocactus speciosus Disocactus speciosus Sun cereus Photo: CC BY, Erick Vélez Sánchez

Other Abies 42 in the reference

Abies alba Abies alba European Silver fir Photo: CC BY, Thomas EbnerAbies amabilis Abies amabilis Pacific silver fir Photo: CC0, author not statedAbies balsamea Abies balsamea Balsam fir Photo: CC0, author not stated Abies beshanzuensis Baishan Fir Abies × borisii-regis Abies × borisii-regis Bulgarian Fir Photo: CC BY, Vasileia SefAbies bracteata Abies bracteata Bristlecone fir Photo: CC0, author not statedAbies cephalonica Abies cephalonica Greek fir Photo: CC0, author not stated Abies chensiensis Shensi Fir Abies cilicica Abies cilicica Cilician fir Photo: CC BY, smeckertAbies concolor Abies concolor Colorado white-fir Photo: CC BY, Roberto Daniel AvilaAbies delavayi Abies delavayi Delavay's fir Photo: CC BY, SarahDepper on FlickrAbies densa Abies densa Sikkim fir Photo: CC0, author not stated all 43 ›

Names & registers

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Pinaceae
Described by
Rehder
Native to
Mexico Northeast, Mexico Southwest, Mexico Southeast +3
Wild records
390 in range · 280 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-21
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-21homonym key checked: GBIF holds no one usage of Abies guatemalensis Rehder under another key, so the key is left as it is; GBIF's key 2685507 is Abies guatemalensis Rehd.; the page links Kew's Abies guatemalensis Rehder, and the name is cited as Kew cites it
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-21names fetched 2026-10-21
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 3 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (3 at a botanic garden or arboretum; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-21
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-21NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 19.50_-104.375, lapse-corrected +1107 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: the correction for elevation, +1107 m, is beyond the 1,000 m either way that a lapse rate is applied over, so the weather cell's ground is other terrain than the typical spot's, so no cold floor is shown
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-21
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-21
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 46 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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