Species
+

Pyracantha coccinea M.Roem.

Feuerdorn (DE), Firethorn, Red Firethorn, Scarlet firethorn

Climate known 57 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Pyracantha coccinea, the scarlet firethorn is the European species of firethorn or red firethorn that has been cultivated in gardens since the late 16th century.

Text from Wikipedia, “Pyracantha coccinea”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Pyracantha

Pyracantha, the firethorn, is a genus of thorny, evergreen shrubs or small trees in the family Rosaceae native to south-eastern Europe and Asia. Pyracantha are cultivated as ornamental plants. They resemble and are related to Cotoneaster, but only Pyracantha has thorns, bumpy leaf edges, and yellow anthers, while Cotoneaster does not grow thorns.

Text from Wikipedia, “Pyracantha”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Rosaceae
Described by
M.Roem.
Native to
Switzerland, France, Spain +12
Wild records
1091 in range· 972 open

At a glance

Warmest month
26°C
Jul, mean day; nights 16 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
824mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Oct 93 mm (CHELSA)
Light
8–40DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (September to January and March to May in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 824 mm a year, wettest October at 93 mm, driest July at 49 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 8 to 40 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -6.7 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Cotoneaster pyracantha (L.) Spach; Cotoneaster pyracantha subsp. lalandei L.Möller; Crataegus dumosa Salisb.; Crataegus hyracantha Steven; Crataegus lalandei May and 30 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (September to January and March to May in the northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (607 mm of 824 mm) takes 8 months, September to January and March to May. Mean temperature moves 17.1 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: March to July and September to November.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: 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 gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 824 mm a year, wettest October at 93 mm, driest July at 49 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

824 mm a year at the habitat, 607 mm of it September to January and March to May. Wettest month October at 93 mm, driest July at 49 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 655 mm to 1182 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 8 to 40 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 8 to 40 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 5, the highest 90th-percentile month 46).

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.

Warmth and air Cold floor -6.7 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -6.7 °C, the absolute minimum -19.3 °C, about 55 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 31.1 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 1.2 °C in January (across the envelope cells -1.8 °C to 4.4 °C), warmest day 26.1 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -6.7 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 57 to 65% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 8 °C in Jan to 26 °C in Jul; mean night from 1 °C in Jan to 16 °C in Aug. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 824 mm of rain a year, most in Oct. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 957 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -19.3 °C and the 99th-percentile day 31.1 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-30°-20°-10°10°20°30°40°frost31.1° 99th-percentile day (undated)-19.3° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125150mm rainDLI 8–40RH 57–65 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 957 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C8 / 5–119 / 6–1212 / 10–1515 / 13–1719 / 17–2223 / 20–2626 / 22–3026 / 22–2922 / 19–2517 / 15–2012 / 9–148 / 6–11
Night °C1 / -2–41 / -1–54 / 1–76 / 4–910 / 8–1314 / 11–1716 / 14–2016 / 14–2013 / 11–1610 / 8–135 / 3–92 / -1–6
Rain mm68 / 47–9955 / 40–8258 / 42–8672 / 51–10472 / 52–11158 / 33–9249 / 16–8155 / 28–8675 / 49–11493 / 66–13887 / 58–13482 / 60–123
DLI10 / 6–1316 / 11–1924 / 19–2831 / 28–3536 / 33–4139 / 35–4640 / 34–4635 / 30–4027 / 21–3117 / 13–2111 / 7–148 / 5–11
RH %64 / 59–6861 / 58–6559 / 56–6359 / 56–6159 / 56–6158 / 54–6157 / 52–6158 / 53–6159 / 56–6262 / 59–6564 / 60–6865 / 59–69

Each figure is the median across the 957 grid cells holding the 1088 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 823:3650 (48.825, 2.525). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -19.3 °C, 1st-percentile night -6.7 °C, 99th-percentile day 31.1 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 957 distinct grid cells holding the 1088 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 823:3650 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 49.00_2.500, lapse-corrected -25 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 67 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 every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeSwitzerland, France, Spain, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Turkey-in-Europe, Yugoslavia, Krym, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Iran, Lebanon-Syria, Turkey· introduced: Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, Corse, Portugal, Free State, Northern Provinces, Uzbekistan, British Columbia, Ontario, Oregon, Washington, Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Indiana, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Arizona, California, Utah, New Mexico, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Peru
Kew's description“shrub” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker43.768, 4.868 · in the densest population, 369 records (34% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1091 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 972 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 3 km away. 605 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 3 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 2° block of the 1091 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Pyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccineaPyracantha coccinea

Photographs: (c) Chelsea Welch, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Gianni Del Bufalo bygdb, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) WATANABE Hitoshi 渡辺仁, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Pyracantha coccinea, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Determination of conjugated linolenic acid content of selected oil seeds grown in Turkey
Sevil Yücel (2005) · Journal of the American Oil Chemists Society
Assessment of cationic dye biosorption characteristics of untreated and non-conventional biomass: Pyracantha coccinea berries
Tamer Akar, Burcu Anılan, Asli Görgülü Arı, Sibel Tunali Akar (2009) · Journal of Hazardous Materials
Determination of the Effect of Drought Stress on the Seed Germination in Some Plant Species
Nurcan Yiğit, Hakan Şevik, Mehmet Çetin, Nur Kaya (2016) · InTech eBooks
Flavonoid distribution in Pyracantha coccinea plants at different growth phases
Gelsomina Fico, Anna Rita Bilia, Ivano Morelli, Franca Tomé (2000) · Biochemical Systematics and Ecology
Use of Pyracantha coccinea Roem. as a possible biomonitor for the selected heavy metals
N. Akguc, İbrahim İlker Özyiğit, Ülkühan Yaşar, Zeliha Leblebici (2010) · International Journal of Environmental Science and Technology
Antibacterial and Antitumor Activities of Some Wild Fruits Grown in Turkey
Arzu Uçar Türker, Arzu Birinci Yıldırım, Fatma Pehlivan Karakaş (2012) · Biotechnology & Biotechnological Equipment
Response of native parasitoids to a range‐expanding host
B. CHRIS GRÖBLER, Owen T. Lewis (2008) · Ecological Entomology

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Pyracantha 3 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 126 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.