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Ambrosia artemisiifolia; photograph (c) Bobo-X, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Bobo-X, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-09-26

Ambrosia artemisiifolia L.

Ragweed; Annual ragweed; Roman wormwood; Short ragweed

Asteraceae · Alaska, Northwest Territories +57

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Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph (c) Мирослав Соболев, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph (c) Мирослав Соболев, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph (c) Мирослав Соболев, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph (c) Мирослав Соболев, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph (c) xulescu_g, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph (c) xulescu_g, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) 68 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-6.0°C
Record low -16.7 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
31°C
Jul at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,292mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
16–39DLI
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
Rain spread: 70% of the median year's rain takes 8 months, so no short rainy season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Ambrosia artemisiifolia, with the common names common ragweed, annual ragweed, and low ragweed, is a species of the genus Ambrosia native to regions of the Americas.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Ambrosia artemisiifolia", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Ambrosia

In the ancient Greek myths, ambrosia is the food or drink of the Greek gods, and is often depicted as conferring longevity or immortality upon whoever consumed it. It was brought to the gods in Olympus by doves and served either by Hebe or by Ganymede at the heavenly feast.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Ambrosia", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (856 mm of 1,146 mm) takes 8 months, March to October. Mean temperature moves 19.1 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: September to April.

Rain

1,146 mm in the median year at the habitat, 856 mm of it March to October. Wettest month July at 125 mm, driest month January at 65 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 948 mm to 1,558 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,292 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,146 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: 16 to 39 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 10, the highest 90th-percentile month 42).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -6.0 °C, the absolute minimum -16.7 °C, 1,576 frost nights in 44 years, 35.8 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 40.7 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 4.1 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -7.2 °C to 16.1 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 30.7 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -6.0 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 56 to 61% 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. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected +35 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. 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 Ambrosia artemisiifolia through the yearWarmest month July, mean daily high 31 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low 4.1 °C; 1,146 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°50°frost40.7° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-16.7° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250mm rainDLI 16–39RH 56–61%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 441 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C14 / 0–2316 / 2–2420 / 8–2523 / 14–2827 / 20–3029 / 25–3231 / 28–3330 / 27–3229 / 23–3125 / 16–2819 / 9–2615 / 2–24
Night °C4 / -7–166 / -6–179 / -2–1813 / 4–2018 / 10–2222 / 16–2423 / 18–2523 / 18–2521 / 14–2515 / 8–2310 / 2–206 / -4–18
Rain mm65 / 44–11971 / 49–12795 / 63–13185 / 62–114106 / 75–137123 / 101–232125 / 90–206117 / 80–223109 / 80–22496 / 73–14181 / 52–11673 / 44–120
DLI18 / 12–2322 / 18–2829 / 26–3436 / 32–4039 / 37–4239 / 38–4139 / 38–4236 / 34–3831 / 27–3325 / 19–2819 / 13–2416 / 10–21
RH %58 / 57–6258 / 57–6057 / 55–5956 / 55–5858 / 56–6060 / 57–6361 / 57–6461 / 57–6460 / 57–6458 / 56–6159 / 57–6059 / 57–62
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 441 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (532 records in those cells; 7 more cells hold records but no land by the elevation layer, so those records sit at sea and the cells are left out), 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 1150:1694 (32.475, -95.275). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -16.7 °C, 1st-percentile night -6.0 °C, 99th-percentile day 40.7 °C. 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 441 distinct grid cells holding 532 of the 540 in-range records (7 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1150:1694 (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 32.50_-95.000, lapse-corrected +35 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 159 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.
NativeAlaska, Northwest Territories, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward I., Québec, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Indiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, West Virginia, Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, District of Columbia · introduced: Denmark, Great Britain, Ireland, Norway, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Corse, France, Portugal, Spain, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Romania, Yugoslavia, Belarus, Baltic States, Krym, East European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ukraine, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Madeira, Zambia, Botswana, KwaZulu-Natal, Free State, Northern Provinces, Mauritius, Buryatiya, Irkutsk, West Siberia, Amur, Khabarovsk, Magadan, Primorye, Sakhalin, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Afghanistan, Iran, Lebanon-Syria, Palestine, Turkey, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Assam, India, West Himalaya, Jawa, New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia, Hawaii, Newfoundland, Mexico Northwest, Peru, Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast, Brazil North, Brazil South · 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 marker26.32, -80.245 · in the densest population, 198 records (35% of those in range)
Kew's description“annual or perennial” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 572 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 532 of them in the land cells it reads, of 540 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 54 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 33 km away. 187 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 32 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 of the 572 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Ambrosia artemisiifolia, photograph 1did not loadAmbrosia artemisiifolia, photograph 2did not loadAmbrosia artemisiifolia, photograph 3did not loadAmbrosia artemisiifolia, photograph 4did not loadAmbrosia artemisiifolia, photograph 5did not loadAmbrosia artemisiifolia, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Мирослав Соболев, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) xulescu_g, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (2).

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

Toxicodendron radicans Toxicodendron radicans Poison ivy Photo: CC BY, Sandy WolkenbergAzolla caroliniana Azolla caroliniana Carolina mosquito-fern Photo: CC BY, Daughter DadSamolus parviflorus Samolus parviflorus Seaside brookweed Photo: CC0, author not statedVitis rotundifolia Vitis rotundifolia Muscadine grape Photo: CC BY, Alan RockefellerErianthus giganteus Erianthus giganteus Poaceae Photo: CC BY, Leila DasherErigeron canadensis Erigeron canadensis Canadian fleabane Photo: CC BY, Michael J. Papay

Other Ambrosia 19 in the reference

Ambrosia acanthicarpa Ambrosia acanthicarpa Annual bursage Photo: CC BY, Anders HastingsAmbrosia ambrosioides Ambrosia ambrosioides Big bursage Photo: CC BY, Bruce HartmanAmbrosia arborescens Ambrosia arborescens Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Efrain FreireAmbrosia bryantii Ambrosia bryantii Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Juan Cruzado CortésAmbrosia chamissonis Ambrosia chamissonis Beachbur Photo: CC0, author not statedAmbrosia cheiranthifolia Ambrosia cheiranthifolia South Texas ambrosia Photo: CC BY, Eric KnightAmbrosia chenopodiifolia Ambrosia chenopodiifolia San Diego bursage Photo: CC BY, Sula VanderplankAmbrosia confertiflora Ambrosia confertiflora Weakleaf burr ragweed Photo: CC BY, CK2AZAmbrosia cordifolia Ambrosia cordifolia Tucson burr ragweed Photo: CC0, author not statedAmbrosia deltoidea Ambrosia deltoidea Triangle bursage Photo: CC BY, Matt BergerAmbrosia dumosa Ambrosia dumosa White bur-sage Photo: CC BY, CK2AZAmbrosia hispida Ambrosia hispida Coastal ragweed Photo: CC BY, Alexis López Hernández all 20 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Ambrosia artemisiaefolia var. diversifolia; Ambrosia artemisiaefolia var. elatior; Ambrosia artemisiifolia f. artemisiifolia; Ambrosia artemisiifolia f. gracilissima; Ambrosia artemisiifolia f. villosa and 26 more. (GBIF Backbone)

Under another author Ambrosia peruviana Cabrera, 1941 is an older name of this species, not Ambrosia peruviana, a species of the reference. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Asteraceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Alaska, Northwest Territories, Alberta +56
Wild records
572 in range · 54 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 2026-10-21
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 answeredasked 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence search API; 31 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (21 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 1 at a herbarium, 9 at a zoo; 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 32.50_-95.000, lapse-corrected +35 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21found by its label; its IPNI identifier 176058-1 is Kew's for Ambrosia artemisiifolia L.
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 5 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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