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Pinus leiophylla; photograph (c) Ian McFaul, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Ian McFaul, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-06-27

Pinus leiophylla Schiede ex Schltdl. & Cham.

Smooth-leaved Pine; Chihuahua Pine; Chihuahuan pine; Smooth-leaf pine

Pinaceae · Arizona, New Mexico +5 · listed by its genus as a temperate garden plant

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Pinus leiophylla, photograph (c) Oscar C. González Martínez, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)Pinus leiophylla, photograph (c) Oscar C. González Martínez, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)Pinus leiophylla, photograph (c) Oscar C. González Martínez, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)Pinus leiophylla, photograph (c) CK2AZ, some rights reserved (CC BY)Pinus leiophylla, photograph (c) CK2AZ, some rights reserved (CC BY)Pinus leiophylla, photograph (c) CK2AZ, some rights reserved (CC BY) 93 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-2.0°C
Record low -6.9 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
24°C
May and Jun at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
921mm
7 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
29–49DLI
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
Wet summers: the rain comes June to September, read as a summer growing season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Pinus leiophylla, the Chihuahua pine, smooth-leaf pine, or yellow pine (in Mexico, tlacocote and ocote chino), is a species of conifer in the family Pinaceae, a pine tree with a range primarily in Mexico, with a small extension into the United States in southeast Arizona and southwest New Mexico. The Mexican range extends along the Sierra Madre Occidental and Sierra Madre del Sur from Chihuahua to Oaxaca, from 29° North Lat. to 17°, between 1600 and 3000 meters altitude. It requires about a rainfall 600 to 1000 mm a year, mostly in summer. It tolerates frosts in winter.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Pinus leiophylla", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Grouped as a temperate garden plant, listed under the genus Pinus in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “tree”, “temperate”.

Seasons

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (669 mm of 871 mm) falls in June to September, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 16.9 °C against a yearly mean of 14.0 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: December to March.

Rain

871 mm in the median year at the habitat, 669 mm of it June to September. Wettest month July at 209 mm, driest months (2 at 14 mm). Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 538 mm to 1,443 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 921 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 871 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: 29 to 49 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 22, the highest 90th-percentile month 52).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -2.0 °C, the absolute minimum -6.9 °C, 509 frost nights in 44 years, 11.6 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 28.1 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 2.8 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -1.6 °C to 7.3 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 24.3 °C in May (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -2.0 °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: 45 to 62% 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 +164 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.

Group. Listed under the genus Pinus in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “tree”, “temperate”. A group is taken only where Kew's description of the species agrees with the table's listing. The table gives no figure and no prose; the cold floor is the habitat's alone.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Pinus leiophylla through the yearWarmest months May and June, mean daily high 24 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low 2.8 °C; 871 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.-10°0°10°20°30°40°frost28.1° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-6.9° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400mm rainDLI 29–49RH 45–62%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 536 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 °C16 / 11–2118 / 13–2220 / 16–2522 / 19–2724 / 21–2824 / 19–2922 / 18–2822 / 18–2721 / 18–2620 / 17–2418 / 15–2217 / 12–21
Night °C3 / -2–73 / -1–85 / 0–97 / 3–119 / 6–1312 / 9–1511 / 9–1611 / 9–1611 / 9–158 / 6–125 / 2–104 / -1–8
Rain mm32 / 13–5318 / 11–3814 / 5–2914 / 6–4226 / 12–96130 / 25–249209 / 113–307193 / 110–292137 / 61–25459 / 34–11722 / 13–4017 / 7–54
DLI31 / 24–3437 / 30–3944 / 39–4548 / 45–4949 / 43–5242 / 35–5238 / 33–4437 / 33–4134 / 30–3834 / 31–3532 / 26–3429 / 22–32
RH %51 / 47–5449 / 45–5347 / 42–5145 / 39–5349 / 39–5758 / 38–6562 / 51–6862 / 54–6862 / 49–6957 / 47–6552 / 46–5952 / 47–55
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 536 grid cells holding the 781 in-range records, 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 1408:1625 (19.575, -98.725). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -6.9 °C, 1st-percentile night -2.0 °C, 99th-percentile day 28.1 °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 536 distinct grid cells holding 781 of the 781 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1408:1625 (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 19.50_-98.750, lapse-corrected +164 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 2797 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.
NativeArizona, New Mexico, Mexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southwest · 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 marker23.392, -104.292 · in the densest population, 1275 records (73% of those in range)
Kew's description“tree” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 1745 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 781 of them placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 1516 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 15 km away. 4 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 964 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 inside the densest 4° block of the 1745 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Pinus leiophylla, photograph 1did not loadPinus leiophylla, photograph 2did not loadPinus leiophylla, photograph 3did not loadPinus leiophylla, photograph 4did not loadPinus leiophylla, photograph 5did not loadPinus leiophylla, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Oscar C. González Martínez, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (3); (c) CK2AZ, 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.

Lonicera pilosa Lonicera pilosa Caprifoliaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, M. Socorro González ElizondoSolanum stoloniferum Solanum stoloniferum Fendler's nighshade Photo: CC BY, Brynn FrickePenstemon campanulatus Penstemon campanulatus Bellflower beardtongue Photo: CC BY-SA, Oscar C. González MartínezEryngium sparganophyllum Eryngium sparganophyllum Arizona eryngo Photo: CC0, author not statedConopholis alpina Conopholis alpina Alpine cancer-root Photo: CC BY-SA, bmasintonArbutus tessellata Arbutus tessellata Ericaceae Photo: CC BY, Carlos Martínez

Other Pinus 110 in the reference

Pinus albicaulis Pinus albicaulis Whitebark pine Photo: CC0, author not statedPinus aristata Pinus aristata Colorado bristlecone pine Photo: CC0, author not statedPinus arizonica Pinus arizonica Arizona pine Photo: CC BY, CK2AZPinus armandi Pinus armandi Pinaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, nekonoir on FlickrPinus attenuata Pinus attenuata Knobcone pine Photo: CC BY, Max MileyPinus × attenuradiata Pinus × attenuradiata Pinaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedPinus ayacahuite Pinus ayacahuite Mexican white pine Photo: CC BY, Neptalí Ramírez MarcialPinus balfouriana Pinus balfouriana Foxtail pine Photo: CC0, author not statedPinus banksiana Pinus banksiana Jack pine Photo: CC BY, Nathan AaronPinus bhutanica Pinus bhutanica Bhutan Pine Photo: CC BY, Tandin Wangdi Pinus brachyptera Pinaceae Pinus brutia Pinus brutia Calabrian pine Photo: CC BY, Ксения Волянская all 111 ›

Names & registers

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Pinaceae
Described by
Schiede ex Schltdl. & Cham.
Native to
Arizona, New Mexico, Mexico Central +4
Wild records
1745 in range · 1516 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 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
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 herbarium; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-22
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 19.50_-98.750, lapse-corrected +164 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
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 2026-10-22
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 83 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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