Oplopanax japonicus Nakai
Japanese Devil's Club
Cited as Kew's World Checklist cites it, Oplopanax japonicus Nakai: GBIF's backbone key for this page carries the name with another author, (Nakai) Nakai.
16 photographs › At a glance
- Jan
- Feb
- Mar, shaded
- Apr
- May, shaded
- Jun, shaded
- Jul, shaded
- Aug, shaded
- Sep, shaded
- Oct, shaded
- Nov
- Dec
Summary
Oplopanax japonicus is species of deciduous shrub that can grow as high as 3 m (9.8 ft) tall. The plant is densely packed with spines that, when touched, cause irritation. This species belongs to a genus that is rich in calcium oxalate, which is toxic to the digestive system.
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Oplopanax japonicus", CC BY-SA 4.0.
Cultivation
Seasons
The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,726 mm of 2,367 mm) falls in March and May to October, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 11.2 °C against a yearly mean of 5.3 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to April and September.
Rain
2,367 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,726 mm of it March and May to October. Wettest month July at 330 mm, driest month December at 105 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 1,573 mm to 3,459 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 2,488 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 2,367 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: 15 to 34 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 11, the highest 90th-percentile month 35).
Warmth and air
Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low -13.4 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -16.9 °C to -7.2 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 21.7 °C in August (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is -13.4 °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.
Relative humidity at the habitat: 58 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
Mean daily high from -5 °C in Jan to 22 °C in Aug; mean nightly low from -13 °C in Jan to 14 °C in Aug. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low. 2,367 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added), the wettest month Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 59 habitat cells. 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 | -5 / -7–0 | -4 / -7–1 | 1 / -3–5 | 7 / 4–11 | 13 / 10–16 | 17 / 14–20 | 20 / 17–23 | 22 / 19–25 | 18 / 15–21 | 11 / 9–15 | 5 / 2–9 | -2 / -4–3 |
| Night °C | -13 / -17–-7 | -12 / -16–-7 | -8 / -11–-4 | -3 / -5–2 | 4 / 1–7 | 9 / 6–12 | 13 / 10–17 | 14 / 11–18 | 10 / 7–14 | 3 / 1–7 | -4 / -6–1 | -10 / -12–-4 |
| Rain mm | 110 / 49–205 | 120 / 60–181 | 164 / 99–220 | 161 / 107–222 | 194 / 138–253 | 243 / 165–330 | 330 / 223–439 | 263 / 191–405 | 321 / 235–380 | 211 / 157–276 | 145 / 75–280 | 105 / 38–242 |
| DLI | 17 / 13–20 | 22 / 19–26 | 28 / 26–30 | 33 / 31–35 | 34 / 32–35 | 30 / 29–33 | 30 / 27–31 | 31 / 27–32 | 24 / 22–25 | 20 / 19–23 | 17 / 13–19 | 15 / 11–18 |
| RH % | 64 / 57–71 | 62 / 56–69 | 60 / 56–64 | 58 / 56–61 | 60 / 58–62 | 65 / 63–66 | 68 / 66–71 | 67 / 65–70 | 66 / 64–69 | 62 / 58–65 | 61 / 55–66 | 62 / 55–70 |
The daily extremes were not used: the correction for elevation, +1050 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 -21.5 °C, 1st-percentile night -17.0 °C.
How this section is made
Natural habitat
How this section is made
Photographs
Photographs: author not stated, no rights reserved · CC0; (c) Adam Kamal, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) 岸本年郎, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Marco Mussita, some rights reserved (CC BY).
Related
Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.
Abies mariesii Marie's fir Photo: CC BY, 岸本年郎
Phyllodoce nipponica Ericaceae Photo: CC BY, Yoshimasa Uchiyama
Gentiana makinoi Gentianaceae Photo: CC BY, Marco Mussita
Ribes japonicum Grossulariaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Qwert1234
Sorbus matsumurana Rosaceae Photo: CC BY, 岸本年郎
Trollius japonicus Ranunculaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Σ64Other Oplopanax 2 in the reference
Oplopanax elatus Japanese devil's-club Photo: CC BY, Tatyana Petrenko
Oplopanax horridus Devil's club Photo: CC BY, John Brew Names & registers
Also known as Aralia faribuki; Aralia laribuki; Echinopanax horridus subsp. japonicus; Echinopanax japonicus; Oplopanax horridus var. brevilobus and 1 more. (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 2026-10-22
gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22GBIF's key 3036349 is Oplopanax japonicus (Nakai) Nakai; the page links Kew's Oplopanax japonicus Nakai, and the name is cited as Kew cites itgbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22wcvp.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; 2 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (2 at a botanic garden or arboretum; Wikidata's list)climate answeredasked 2026-10-22climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 38.00_140.625, lapse-corrected +1050 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: the correction for elevation, +1050 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 shownwikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22inat.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 2026-10-22none 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 rulesopenalex 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 29 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.