Species
+

Aconitum napellus L.

Monk's Hood, Monk's-Hood, Módre hołbiki, Módre črijki

Climate known 81 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Aconitum napellus, monkshood, aconite, Venus' chariot or wolfsbane, is a species of highly toxic flowering plants in the genus Aconitum of the family Ranunculaceae, native and endemic to western and central Europe. A perennial plant, it is herbaceous and grows to 1 m tall, with hairless stems and leaves. The leaves are rounded, 5–10 cm (2.0–3.9 in) diameter, palmately divided into five to seven deeply lobed segments. The flowers are dark purple to bluish-purple, narrow oblong helmet-shaped, 1–2 cm (0.39–0.79 in) tall. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Aconitum napellus”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Aconitum

Aconitum, also known as aconite, monkshood, wolfsbane, devil's helmet, or blue rocket, is a genus of over 250 species of flowering plants belonging to the family Ranunculaceae. These herbaceous, frequently toxic perennial plants are chiefly native to the mountainous parts of the Northern Hemisphere in North America, Europe, and Asia, growing in the moisture-retentive but well-draining soils of mountain meadows.

Text from Wikipedia, “Aconitum”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Ranunculaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia +7
Wild records
1340 in range· 1042 open

At a glance

Warmest month
19°C
Jul, mean day; nights 10 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1374mm/yr
12 wet months · peak May 136 mm (CHELSA)
Light
7–36DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (May to December in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 1374 mm a year, wettest May at 136 mm, driest February at 84 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 7 to 36 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -13.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Aconitum funkianum Rchb.; Aconitum napellus subsp. eminens (W.D.J.Koch) Murr; Aconitum nutans Hort.Helmst.; Aconitum nutans Hort.Helmst. ex Steud.; Aconitum occidentale Timb.-Lagr.f. and 2 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (May to December in the northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (981 mm of 1374 mm) takes 8 months, May to December. Mean temperature moves 17.5 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to June.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: 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 gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 1374 mm a year, wettest May at 136 mm, driest February at 84 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1374 mm a year at the habitat, 981 mm of it May to December. Wettest month May at 136 mm, driest February at 84 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 845 mm to 2109 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

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

Light Open sky over the habitat: 7 to 36 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 7 to 36 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 5, the highest 90th-percentile month 42).

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.

Warmth and air Cold floor -13.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -13.1 °C, the absolute minimum -25.1 °C, about 178 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 26.7 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -6.7 °C in January (across the envelope cells -14.9 °C to 0.4 °C), warmest day 19.2 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -13.1 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 61 to 64% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 1 °C in Jan to 19 °C in Jul; mean night from -7 °C in Jan to 10 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1374 mm of rain a year, most in May. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 1012 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -25.1 °C and the 99th-percentile day 26.7 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-30°-20°-10°10°20°30°frost26.7° 99th-percentile day (undated)-25.1° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250mm rainDLI 7–36RH 61–64 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 1012 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C1 / -6–62 / -4–76 / -1–109 / 2–1413 / 7–1817 / 12–2119 / 14–2319 / 14–2316 / 11–1912 / 6–156 / -1–102 / -6–6
Night °C-7 / -15–0-6 / -14–0-3 / -10–3-1 / -7–54 / -2–97 / 2–1210 / 4–1410 / 4–147 / 1–113 / -3–8-2 / -10–4-5 / -14–1
Rain mm105 / 63–15784 / 50–136101 / 60–162103 / 55–157136 / 71–197126 / 71–223125 / 67–246124 / 70–241121 / 68–187115 / 73–176117 / 70–173117 / 72–182
DLI9 / 6–1315 / 11–2023 / 18–2830 / 28–3534 / 32–3836 / 33–4136 / 33–4231 / 28–3623 / 20–2916 / 13–2010 / 7–147 / 5–11
RH %62 / 56–6961 / 57–6661 / 58–6461 / 59–6462 / 59–6462 / 59–6461 / 58–6462 / 58–6463 / 60–6563 / 60–6664 / 59–6963 / 57–70

Each figure is the median across the 1012 grid cells holding the 1330 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 945:3599 (42.725, -0.025). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -25.1 °C, 1st-percentile night -13.1 °C, 99th-percentile day 26.7 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 1012 distinct grid cells holding the 1330 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 945:3599 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 42.50_0.000, lapse-corrected +483 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1807 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 every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeAustria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Switzerland, France, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Yugoslavia· introduced: Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Baltic States, New York, Vermont
Kew's description“perennial or tuberous geophyte” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker47.163, 10.088 · in the densest population, 1045 records (78% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1340 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 1042 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 10 km away. 194 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 10 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 4° block of the 1340 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Aconitum napellusAconitum napellusAconitum napellusAconitum napellusAconitum napellusAconitum napellusAconitum napellusAconitum napellus

Photographs: (c) Jacek Pietruszewski, some rights reserved (CC BY) (8).

Photographs: iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Aconitum napellus, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Plantas medicinais: fatores de influência no conteúdo de metabólitos secundários
Leonardo Gobbo‐Neto, Norberto Peporine Lopes (2007) · Química Nova
Tumor-associated macrophages: an effective player of the tumor microenvironment
Udit Basak, Tania Sarkar, Sumon Mukherjee, Sourio Chakraborty (2023) · Frontiers in Immunology
Comprehensive review of cardiovascular toxicity of drugs and related agents
Přemysl Mladěnka, Lenka Applová, Jiří Patočka, Vera Marisa Costa (2018) · Medicinal Research Reviews
Neurotoxins and Their Binding Areas on Voltage-Gated Sodium Channels
Marijke Stevens, Steve Peigneur, Jan Tytgat (2011) · Frontiers in Pharmacology
Historical ethnobotanical review of medicinal plants used to treat children diseases in Romania (1860s–1970s)
Mădălina Petran, Dorin Dragoș, Marilena Gîlcă (2020) · Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine
A review on phytochemistry, pharmacology and toxicology studies of Aconitum
Nyirimigabo Eric, Yanyan Xu, Yubo Li, Yuming Wang (2014) · Journal of Pharmacy and Pharmacology
Synopsis der Mitteleuropaïschen flora
P. Ascherson, Paul Graebner, Paul Graebner (1896) · W. Engelmann eBooks
Biogeografia de Portugal Continental
José Carlos Costa, Carlos Aguiar, Jorge Capelo, Mário Lousã (1998) · Portuguese National Funding Agency for Science, Research and Technology (RCAAP Project by FCT)
Plant Extracellular Vesicles and Nanovesicles: Focus on Secondary Metabolites, Proteins and Lipids with Perspectives on Their Potential and Sources
Eric Woith, Gea Guerriero, Jean-François Hausman, Jenny Renaut (2021) · International Journal of Molecular Sciences

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 150 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.