Species
+

Spiraea salicifolia L.

Bridal-spray, Bridewort, Bridewort (EN), Bridewort, Willowleaf spiraea

Climate known 50 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

Spiraea salicifolia, the bridewort, willow-leaved meadowsweet, spice hardhack, or Aaron's beard, is a species of flowering plant in the family Rosaceae. A shrub, it is native to east-central Europe, Kazakhstan, all of Siberia, the Russian Far East, Mongolia, northern China, Korea, and Japan, and it has been widely introduced to the rest of Europe and to eastern North America. It has been cultivated since the 1500s for hedges and similar applications, but is not particularly well-behaved.

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

About the genus · Spiraea

Spiraea, sometimes spelled spirea in common names, and commonly known as meadowsweets or steeplebushes, is a genus of about 80 to 100 species of shrubs in the family Rosaceae. They are native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere, with the greatest diversity in eastern Asia.

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

Family
Rosaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Austria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary +27
Wild records
624 in range· 332 open

At a glance

Warmest month
23°C
Jul, mean day; nights 14 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
664mm/yr
11 wet months · peak Jul 109 mm (CHELSA)
Light
6–36DLI
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: a summer growing season, May to October in the northern hemisphere (May to October at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 664 mm a year, wettest July at 109 mm, driest February at 21 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 6 to 36 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -22.5 °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 Spiraea alba f. lanceolata (Torr. & A.Gray) C.K.Schneid.; Spiraea alba var. lanceolata Farw., 1918; Spiraea amena var. pauciflora Raf.; Spiraea amoena Rafinesque; Spiraea arguta Hoffmanns. and 38 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a summer growing season, May to October in the northern hemisphere (May to October at the habitat, northern).

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

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the year's rain (479 mm of 664 mm) falls in May to October, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 13.3 °C against a yearly mean of 3.3 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to April.

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 664 mm a year, wettest July at 109 mm, driest February at 21 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

664 mm a year at the habitat, 479 mm of it May to October. Wettest month July at 109 mm, driest February at 21 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 388 mm to 1375 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: 6 to 36 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 6 to 36 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 2, the highest 90th-percentile month 40).

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 -22.5 °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 -22.5 °C, the absolute minimum -29.6 °C, about 228 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 20.3 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -19.8 °C in January (across the envelope cells -30.3 °C to -4.3 °C), warmest day 22.8 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -22.5 °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: 56 to 66% 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 -11 °C in Jan to 23 °C in Jul; mean night from -20 °C in Jan to 14 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 664 mm of rain a year, most in Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 472 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -29.6 °C and the 99th-percentile day 20.3 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-40°-30°-20°-10°10°20°30°frost20.3° 99th-percentile day (undated)-29.6° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250300mm rainDLI 6–36RH 56–66 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 472 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 °C-11 / -20–1-7 / -15–40 / -6–89 / 2–1416 / 9–2020 / 15–2423 / 19–2621 / 18–2616 / 11–219 / 2–15-0 / -10–8-7 / -19–3
Night °C-20 / -30–-4-17 / -27–-4-9 / -18–-0-1 / -8–45 / -0–911 / 7–1514 / 11–1813 / 10–188 / 3–142 / -7–8-7 / -20–2-17 / -28–-3
Rain mm25 / 6–5621 / 5–4730 / 8–6739 / 15–7961 / 29–11284 / 55–142109 / 73–290107 / 65–26770 / 42–17048 / 19–9942 / 12–7728 / 8–64
DLI8 / 3–1715 / 8–2225 / 17–2932 / 27–3536 / 33–4036 / 34–4033 / 28–3628 / 26–3122 / 17–2715 / 9–238 / 4–166 / 2–14
RH %66 / 57–7463 / 55–6958 / 53–6356 / 50–6156 / 51–6259 / 55–6561 / 57–6862 / 58–6761 / 58–6460 / 55–6563 / 56–7066 / 56–73

Each figure is the median across the 472 grid cells holding the 555 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 705:6807 (54.725, 160.375). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -29.6 °C, 1st-percentile night -22.5 °C, 99th-percentile day 20.3 °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 472 distinct grid cells holding the 555 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 705:6807 (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 54.50_160.625, lapse-corrected +183 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 460 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.
NativeAustria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia, Ukraine, Altay, Buryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Tuva, West Siberia, Yakutskiya, Amur, Kamchatka, Khabarovsk, Kuril Is., Magadan, Primorye, Sakhalin, Kazakhstan, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, China North-Central, Mongolia, Japan, Korea· introduced: Denmark, Great Britain, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, France, Spain, Albania, Italy, Baltic States, Central European Russia, East European Russia, North European Russia, South European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ontario, Michigan, Vermont, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, Virginia
Kew's description“subshrub” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker52.21, 104.097 · in the densest population, 128 records (21% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 624 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 332 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 5926 km away. 1161 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 69 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 4° block of the 624 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Spiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifoliaSpiraea salicifolia

Photographs: (c) Andrew Bazdyrev, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Roman A. Lagazyuk (Роман А. Лагазюк), some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Ольга Ильина, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Ульяна Ярцева, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Pavel Zhuravlyov, 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 Spiraea salicifolia, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Vegetation, hydrology, and development of a coastal mire in Hokkaido, Japan, affected by flooding and tephra deposition
Stefan Hotes, Peter Poschlod, Hiroshige Sakai, Takashi Inoue (2001) · Canadian Journal of Botany
Wetland restoration by natural succession in abandoned pastures with a degraded soil seed bank
Junko Morimoto, Masatoshi Shibata, Yuichiro Shida, Futoshi Nakamura (2017) · Restoration Ecology
Effects of scale‐dependent factors on herbaceous vegetation patterns in a wetland, northern Japan
Shiro Tsuyuzaki, Akira Haraguchi, Fusayuki Kanda (2004) · Ecological Research
In vitro Screening of Jeju Medicinal Plants for Cosmeceutical Materials
Sang Suk Kim, Chang‐Gu Hyun, Jongsung Lee, Jihee Lim (2007) · Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
A Morphological Study of the Flower and Embryo of Spiraea
Jonathan E. Webb (1902) · Botanical Gazette
Seed dormancy types and germination response of 15 plant species in temperate montane peatlands
Jian‐Yi Wang, Zhao‐Jun Bu, Peter Poschlod, Shuayib Yusup (2024) · Ecology and Evolution
Studies on Moor Vegetation of Mt. Daeam, East-Central Korea
Ki-Ryong Choi, Jae-Kee Koh (1989) · The Korean Journal of Ecology
Spireasalicin, a New Acylated Quercetin Glycoside from Spiraea salicifolia
Д. Н. Оленников, N. I. Kashchenko (2017) · Chemistry of Natural Compounds
Phenolic compounds in taxonomy of the genus Spiraea L.
Evgeniya A. Karpova, N.M. Lapteva (2014) · Turczaninowia
Spiraea salicifolia: a new plant host of “Candidatus Phytoplasma ziziphi”-related phytoplasma
Zhengnan Li, Zhanmin Wu, Hongguang Liu, Xingan Hao (2010) · Journal of General Plant Pathology

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 Spiraea 9 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 156 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.