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Cirsium brevicaule; photograph (c) WATANABE Hitoshi 渡辺仁, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) WATANABE Hitoshi 渡辺仁, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-01-22

Cirsium brevicaule A.Gray

Okinawa Thistle

Asteraceae · Nansei-shoto

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Cirsium brevicaule, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedCirsium brevicaule, photograph (c) Eric Toro Delgado, some rights reserved (CC BY)Cirsium brevicaule, photograph (c) Eric Toro Delgado, some rights reserved (CC BY)Cirsium brevicaule, photograph (c) Moogoo Lee, some rights reserved (CC BY)Cirsium brevicaule, photograph (c) Moogoo Lee, some rights reserved (CC BY)Cirsium brevicaule, photograph (c) Moogoo Lee, some rights reserved (CC BY) 42 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Coldest month, mean nightly low
16.4°C
Feb at the habitat, not a floor; extremes not used (sea cell) CHELSA
Warmest month, mean daily high
29°C
Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
2,282mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
16–42DLI
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.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,766 mm of 2,288 mm) takes 8 months, March to October. Mean temperature moves 10.3 °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

2,288 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,766 mm of it March to October. Wettest month June at 280 mm, driest month January at 122 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 2,152 mm to 2,529 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 2,282 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 2,288 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 42 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 15, the highest 90th-percentile month 42).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 16.4 °C in February (across the grid cells of the range 15.8 °C to 17.4 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 28.5 °C in August (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is 16.4 °C, the coldest month's mean nightly low, February, 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 that is mostly sea and are not used.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 54 to 68% 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 Cirsium brevicaule through the yearWarmest month August, mean daily high 29 °C; coldest month February, mean nightly low 16.4 °C; 2,288 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.10°15°20°25°30°°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400mm rainDLI 16–42RH 54–68%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 27 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 / 18–2019 / 18–1920 / 19–2122 / 21–2324 / 24–2526 / 26–2728 / 28–2929 / 28–2928 / 27–2826 / 25–2623 / 23–2420 / 19–21
Night °C17 / 16–1716 / 16–1718 / 17–1920 / 20–2123 / 22–2425 / 25–2627 / 27–2727 / 27–2726 / 26–2624 / 24–2522 / 21–2218 / 18–19
Rain mm122 / 113–142140 / 129–161178 / 164–202191 / 172–209257 / 235–279280 / 251–307166 / 149–178263 / 245–296255 / 226–286176 / 166–208134 / 123–167126 / 113–146
DLI16 / 15–1619 / 19–2026 / 25–2732 / 31–3234 / 34–3436 / 35–3742 / 41–4238 / 38–3834 / 33–3427 / 26–2719 / 18–1916 / 15–16
RH %55 / 55–5757 / 56–5959 / 59–6162 / 61–6464 / 64–6668 / 68–7066 / 65–6865 / 65–6863 / 62–6559 / 59–6157 / 56–5954 / 54–56

The daily extremes were read at a NASA POWER cell that is 36% land: neither it nor the next candidates whose coldest month's mean nightly low is within 2 °C of the median across cells sit in a POWER cell that is mostly land, and the rule reads a cold floor only from a cell that is mostly land, so none is read for this species. Nor is the coldest month's mean nightly low taken as one: it is a mean of a month's lows, not its coldest night. What that cell gave over 44 years: absolute minimum 8.2 °C, 1st-percentile night 13.2 °C, 99th-percentile day 30.7 °C.

How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 27 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (47 records in those cells; 4 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 1270:6156 (26.475, 127.825). 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 27 distinct grid cells holding 47 of the 52 in-range records (4 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1270:6156 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells, though its NASA POWER cell is only 36% land and none of the 11 next candidates within 2 °C of the median was mostly land); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 26.50_128.125, lapse-corrected +25 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 40 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.
NativeNansei-shoto · 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 marker26.468, 127.828 · in the densest population, 81 records (61% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 132 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 47 of them in the land cells it reads, of 52 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 75 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 433 km away. 133 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 80 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 132 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Cirsium brevicaule, photograph 1did not loadCirsium brevicaule, photograph 2did not loadCirsium brevicaule, photograph 3did not loadCirsium brevicaule, photograph 4did not loadCirsium brevicaule, photograph 5did not loadCirsium brevicaule, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: author not stated, no rights reserved · CC0; (c) Eric Toro Delgado, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Moogoo Lee, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3).

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

Pinus luchuensis Pinus luchuensis Luchu pine Photo: CC BY, rjtizardPteris ryukyuensis Pteris ryukyuensis Pteridaceae Photo: CC BY, りなべるRhododendron scabrum Rhododendron scabrum Ericaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, 石川 Shihchuan from 台北市 (Taipei City), 台灣…Zanthoxylum beecheyanum Zanthoxylum beecheyanum Rutaceae Photo: CC BY, M108tGarcinia subelliptica Garcinia subelliptica Common Garcinia Photo: CC0, author not statedLeptochilus longissimus Leptochilus longissimus Polypodiaceae Photo: CC BY, 曾昱承 Yu-Cheng Zeng

Other Cirsium 56 in the reference

Cirsium acaulon Cirsium acaulon Dwarf Thistle Photo: CC BY, Franck CabotCirsium alsophilum Cirsium alsophilum Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Tony KMCirsium altissimum Cirsium altissimum Roadside thistle Photo: CC BY, hr_dragonflyCirsium arisanense Cirsium arisanense Alishan thistle Photo: CC BY, Rick ChouCirsium arizonicum Cirsium arizonicum Arizona thistle Photo: CC BY, Parker James LloydCirsium arvense Cirsium arvense Creeping thistle Photo: CC BY, Arthur WhitingCirsium brevistylum Cirsium brevistylum Clustered thistle Photo: CC0, author not statedCirsium canum Cirsium canum Queen Anne's thistle Photo: CC BY, Анна МитрошенковаCirsium carniolicum Cirsium carniolicum Asteraceae Photo: CC0, author not statedCirsium carolinianum Cirsium carolinianum Soft thistle Photo: CC BY, Nathan AaronCirsium cymosum Cirsium cymosum Peregrine thistle Photo: CC0, author not statedCirsium decussatum Cirsium decussatum Asteraceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Salicyna all 57 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Cirsium albescens; Cirsium brevicaule subsp. brevicaule; Cirsium brevicaule subsp. oshimense; Cirsium brevicaule var. brevicaule; Cirsium brevicaule var. oshimense and 2 more. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataiNaturalist

The record

Family
Asteraceae
Described by
A.Gray
Native to
Nansei-shoto
Wild records
132 in range · 75 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 answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 1 record within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (1 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 26.50_128.125, lapse-corrected +25 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: NASA POWER's cell is mostly sea (36% land), so no cold floor is shown
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21found by its label; its IPNI identifier 195099-1 is Kew's for Cirsium brevicaule A.Gray
Wikipedia wikipedia nothing to reportasked 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 2026-10-21none 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 rules
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 17 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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