18 photographs › At a glance
- Jan
- Feb
- Mar
- Apr, shaded
- May, shaded
- Jun, shaded
- Jul
- Aug, shaded
- Sep, shaded
- Oct, shaded
- Nov, shaded
- Dec
Summary
Bauhinia picta, known as the algodoncillo, casco de vaca, palo de orquídeas, or pata de vaca, is a species of plant in the family Fabaceae. It is found in Colombia, Mexico, Panama, Venezuela, and Ecuador.
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Bauhinia picta", CC BY-SA 4.0.
About the genus · Bauhinia
Bauhinia is a large genus of flowering plants in the subfamily Cercidoideae and tribe Bauhinieae, in the large flowering plant family Fabaceae, with a pantropical distribution. The genus was named after the Bauhin brothers Gaspard and Johann, Swiss-French botanists.
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Bauhinia", CC BY-SA 4.0.
Cultivation
Seasons
The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,832 mm of 2,550 mm) falls in April to June and August to November. The temperature curve is flat, 0.8 °C between the warmest and coldest month, so the growing-season rule does not infer a growing season from it. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere. The habitat lies within 10° of the equator, where the shift rule does not apply, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.
Rain
2,550 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,832 mm of it April to June and August to November. Wettest month October at 322 mm, driest month January at 85 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 1,706 mm to 3,885 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 2,668 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 2,550 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: 28 to 35 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 25, the highest 90th-percentile month 40).
Warmth and air
Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is 17.7 °C, the absolute minimum 15.8 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 34.7 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 20.0 °C in July (across the grid cells of the range 13.9 °C to 23.3 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 28.4 °C in February and March (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: 17.7 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).
Relative humidity at the habitat: 64 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. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected -37 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
Mean daily high from 27 °C in Jun, Jul, Oct, Nov and Dec to 28 °C in Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Aug and Sep; mean nightly low from 20 °C in Jan, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct and Dec to 21 °C in Feb, Mar, Apr, May and Nov. The cold quarter, Jun to Aug, is the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low, around the first of the 7 months that tie for it. 2,550 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added), the wettest month Oct. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 123 habitat cells. Over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER) the absolute minimum was 15.8 °C and the 99th-percentile day 34.7 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.
Figures by month
| Figure | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Day °C | 28 / 22–32 | 28 / 23–33 | 28 / 23–33 | 28 / 22–31 | 28 / 22–30 | 27 / 22–30 | 27 / 22–31 | 28 / 23–31 | 28 / 22–31 | 27 / 22–30 | 27 / 22–30 | 27 / 22–31 |
| Night °C | 20 / 14–23 | 21 / 14–24 | 21 / 14–24 | 21 / 15–23 | 21 / 15–24 | 20 / 14–23 | 20 / 14–23 | 20 / 14–23 | 20 / 14–23 | 20 / 14–23 | 21 / 15–23 | 20 / 14–23 |
| Rain mm | 85 / 24–157 | 123 / 67–171 | 185 / 106–262 | 282 / 190–398 | 299 / 201–483 | 204 / 115–478 | 184 / 92–475 | 201 / 104–417 | 256 / 157–399 | 322 / 222–456 | 268 / 178–387 | 141 / 68–220 |
| DLI | 32 / 29–35 | 34 / 31–36 | 35 / 31–37 | 32 / 27–36 | 31 / 25–35 | 31 / 25–37 | 33 / 27–39 | 34 / 30–40 | 34 / 29–39 | 31 / 27–35 | 28 / 25–32 | 30 / 27–33 |
| RH % | 65 / 53–69 | 64 / 53–68 | 65 / 56–69 | 68 / 62–71 | 68 / 63–70 | 67 / 61–70 | 65 / 59–69 | 65 / 59–69 | 67 / 60–70 | 68 / 63–72 | 69 / 63–72 | 67 / 59–70 |
How this section is made
Natural habitat
How this section is made
Photographs
Photographs: (c) Edwin Rivera Millán, some rights reserved (CC BY) (6).
Related
Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.
Pachira speciosa Malvaceae Photo: CC BY, Luis G Restrepo
Cupania cinerea Sapindaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Vinicio SINAC
Passiflora quadrangularis Giant granadilla Photo: CC BY, Simone Littledale
Solanum mammosum Nipplefruit Photo: CC0, author not stated
Anthurium crystallinum Crystal Anthurium Photo: CC0, author not statedOther Bauhinia 27 in the reference
Bauhinia aculeata Fabaceae Photo: CC BY, Raúl A. Ruiz M.
Bauhinia acuminata Dwarf white bauhinia Photo: CC BY, Raja Sekhar Chimirala
Bauhinia bowkeri Kei Bauhinia Photo: CC BY, Henry de Lange Bauhinia brachycarpa Fabaceae Bauhinia cheilantha Fabaceae Bauhinia corniculata Fabaceae 
Bauhinia divaricata Fabaceae Photo: CC BY, bemma
Bauhinia forficata Cow's-foot Photo: CC BY, avocat
Bauhinia galpinii African plume Photo: CC BY-SA, Dragonette
Bauhinia grandidieri Fabaceae Photo: CC BY, amantedarmanin Bauhinia grevei Fabaceae Bauhinia hagenbeckii Fabaceae all 28 ›Names & registers
Also known as Bauhinia kalbreyeri; Bauhinia ligulata; Pauletia picta. (GBIF Backbone)
The record
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 answeredasked 2026-10-21gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-21gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-21names fetched 2026-10-21wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 18 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (16 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 2 at a herbarium; Wikidata's list)climate answeredasked 2026-10-21climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-21NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 4.50_-73.125, lapse-corrected -37 m at 6.5 °C/kmwikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-21inat.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 2026-10-22inat.photos.cultivated not askedgbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-21none of the photographs on this page is credited to GBIF: those shown are other sources', and GBIF's were the same photographs or were set aside by the photograph rulescommons answeredasked 2026-10-21openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshotEvery 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 68 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.