Plectocephalus chilensis (Bertero ex Hook. & Arn.) G.Don
Chilean knapweed
Cited as Kew's World Checklist cites it, Plectocephalus chilensis (Bertero ex Hook. & Arn.) G.Don: GBIF's backbone key for this page carries the name with another author, G.Don ex Loudon.
74 photographs › At a glance
- Jan, shaded
- Feb, shaded
- Mar
- Apr
- May
- Jun, under 5 mm of rain
- Jul, under 5 mm of rain
- Aug, under 5 mm of rain
- Sep
- Oct
- Nov, shaded
- Dec, shaded
About the genus · Plectocephalus
Plectocephalus is a genus of flowering plants in the tribe Cardueae within the family Asteraceae, it contains seven described species mostly found in Americas and one in Africa.SpeciesPlectocephalus americanus (Nutt.) D.Don - Mexico, United States Plectocephalus cachinalensis (Phil.) N.Garcia & Susanna - Atacama Region in Chile Plectocephalus chilensis G.Don ex Loudon - Chile Plectocephalus floccosus (Hook. & Arn.) N.Garcia & Susanna - Chile Plectocephalus rothrockii (Greenm.) More on Wikipedia ›
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Plectocephalus", CC BY-SA 4.0.
Cultivation
Seasons
The rain rule reads a winter growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (352 mm of 429 mm) falls in May to August, cooler than the year (wet-season mean 11.2 °C against a yearly mean of 14.7 °C). Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere; shifted six months for a northern-hemisphere collection: November to February.
Rain
429 mm in the median year at the habitat, 352 mm of it May to August. Wettest month July at 107 mm, driest month January at 1 mm; 3 months under 5 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 111 mm to 682 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 423 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 429 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, southern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.
Light
Open sky over the habitat: 18 to 57 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 16, the highest 90th-percentile month 57).
Warmth and air
Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 6.3 °C in July (across the grid cells of the range 0.8 °C to 10.1 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 24.9 °C in January and February (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is 6.3 °C, the coldest month's mean nightly low, July, 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: 56 to 59% 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, southern hemisphere
Mean daily high from 16 °C in Jun, Jul and Aug to 25 °C in Jan and Feb; mean nightly low from 6 °C in Jul to 16 °C in Feb. The cold quarter, Jun to Aug, is the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low. 429 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 118 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 | 25 / 20–29 | 25 / 20–29 | 24 / 20–27 | 21 / 18–24 | 18 / 15–20 | 16 / 13–18 | 16 / 12–17 | 16 / 13–18 | 18 / 14–20 | 20 / 16–22 | 22 / 17–25 | 24 / 19–28 |
| Night °C | 15 / 13–17 | 16 / 13–17 | 14 / 12–16 | 12 / 8–15 | 9 / 5–13 | 8 / 2–11 | 6 / 1–10 | 7 / 2–10 | 8 / 3–11 | 10 / 6–12 | 12 / 9–14 | 14 / 11–15 |
| Rain mm | 1 / 1–4 | 2 / 1–4 | 7 / 2–12 | 16 / 2–33 | 80 / 20–126 | 97 / 24–157 | 107 / 35–159 | 68 / 17–111 | 29 / 4–50 | 13 / 2–22 | 7 / 1–12 | 2 / 1–5 |
| DLI | 56 / 53–57 | 50 / 48–51 | 41 / 40–43 | 30 / 29–33 | 22 / 20–24 | 18 / 16–21 | 20 / 18–23 | 26 / 23–29 | 34 / 32–37 | 45 / 43–47 | 53 / 51–54 | 57 / 54–57 |
| RH % | 57 / 51–67 | 57 / 51–68 | 57 / 51–69 | 57 / 49–69 | 57 / 49–69 | 58 / 49–68 | 58 / 47–67 | 59 / 49–68 | 59 / 51–68 | 58 / 54–68 | 56 / 53–67 | 56 / 51–67 |
The daily extremes were not used: the correction for elevation, -1493 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 -4.5 °C, 1st-percentile night 5.9 °C.
How this section is made
Natural habitat
How this section is made
Photographs
Photographs: (c) Álvaro Parra Valdivia, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Nicolás Lavandero, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3).
Related
Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.
Loasa tricolor Loasaceae Photo: CC0, author not stated
Grimolobium glandulosum Fabaceae Photo: CC BY, Dick Culbert from Gibsons, B.C., Canada
Sphaeralcea obtusiloba Blunt-leaved Chilean Globemallow Photo: CC BY, Cesar Ormazabal
Conanthera campanulata Tecophilaeaceae Photo: CC BY, Nicolás Lavandero
Alstroemeria pulchra Alstroemeriaceae Photo: CC BY, Cesar Ormazabal
Schizanthus porrigens Poor Man’s Orchid Photo: CC BY-SA, Nicolás Villaseca MerinoOther Plectocephalus 1 in the reference
Names & registers
Also known as Centaurea australis; Centaurea chilensis. (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 4226590 is Plectocephalus chilensis G.Don ex Loudon; the page links Kew's Plectocephalus chilensis (Bertero ex Hook. & Arn.) G.Don, 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 answeredasked 2026-10-22GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 49 records of GBIF's key 8452879, Plectocephalus chilensis (Bertero ex Hook. & Arn.) G.Don (Kew's file holds it as Plectocephalus chilensis (Bertero ex Hook. & Arn.) G.Don (accepted)): GBIF occurrence search API; 3 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (3 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 -30.00_-70.625, lapse-corrected -1493 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: the correction for elevation, -1493 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 nothing to reportasked 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 2026-10-22openalex 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 18 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.