Species
+

Trapa natans L.

Common water-chestnut, Water nut, European water chestnut, European water chestnut, European water-chestnut

Climate known 65 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

Trapa natans, the water caltrop, is a widespread species of flowering plant in the genus Trapa, family Lythraceae, grown as a food crop. Other vernacular names include buffalo nut, bat nut, devil pod, ling nut, mustache nut, singhara nut, water nut, and water chestnut, though this last name is commonly applied to Eleocharis dulcis.

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

About the genus · Trapa

Trapa is a genus of floating annual aquatic plants in the Lythraceae family. A well-known species in the genus is Trapa natans, grown as a food crop in China and the Indian subcontinent.

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

Family
Lythraceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany +84
Wild records
965 in range· 643 open

At a glance

Warmest month
25°C
Jul, mean day; nights 16 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
826mm/yr
12 wet months · peak May 85 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: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (April to November in the northern hemisphere). Habitat rain 826 mm a year, wettest May at 85 mm, driest February at 51 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 6 to 36 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -5.7 °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 Trapa acicularis V.N.Vassil.; Trapa alatyrica Sprygin; Trapa alatyrica Sprygin ex V.N.Vassil.; Trapa algeriensis V.N.Vassil.; Trapa amurensis Flerow and 45 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (April to November 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 (606 mm of 826 mm) takes 8 months, April to November. Mean temperature moves 19.5 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: October to May.

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 826 mm a year, wettest May at 85 mm, driest February at 51 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

826 mm a year at the habitat, 606 mm of it April to November. Wettest month May at 85 mm, driest February at 51 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 569 mm to 1730 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 4, the highest 90th-percentile month 38).

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 -5.7 °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 -5.7 °C, the absolute minimum -11.7 °C, about 48 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 34.5 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -2.1 °C in January (across the envelope cells -9.9 °C to 2.0 °C), warmest day 24.9 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -5.7 °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: 58 to 67% 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 5 °C in Jan to 25 °C in Jul; mean night from -2 °C in Jan to 16 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 826 mm of rain a year, most in May. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 743 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -11.7 °C and the 99th-percentile day 34.5 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-20°-10°10°20°30°40°frost34.5° 99th-percentile day (undated)-11.7° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250300mm rainDLI 6–36RH 58–67 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 743 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 °C5 / -4–86 / -4–910 / 2–1314 / 11–1819 / 17–2322 / 21–2625 / 23–2925 / 22–2921 / 18–2616 / 11–2010 / 3–156 / -3–10
Night °C-2 / -10–2-2 / -10–22 / -5–55 / 2–1010 / 8–1413 / 12–1816 / 14–2216 / 14–2312 / 10–199 / 4–143 / -3–8-1 / -7–3
Rain mm53 / 26–11551 / 27–9958 / 31–12066 / 35–12385 / 45–14882 / 56–19981 / 57–26374 / 47–23975 / 50–20475 / 38–16268 / 38–12458 / 24–122
DLI8 / 5–1814 / 10–2321 / 18–2929 / 27–3534 / 32–3736 / 32–3835 / 30–3831 / 28–3424 / 19–2715 / 11–249 / 6–186 / 4–16
RH %66 / 55–7063 / 55–6760 / 56–6358 / 55–6159 / 55–6259 / 56–6458 / 56–6759 / 56–6661 / 58–6363 / 57–6565 / 57–6867 / 56–70

Each figure is the median across the 743 grid cells holding the 923 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 1066:6342 (36.675, 137.125). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -11.7 °C, 1st-percentile night -5.7 °C, 99th-percentile day 34.5 °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 743 distinct grid cells holding the 923 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1066:6342 (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 36.50_136.875, lapse-corrected -431 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 44 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, Germany, Hungary, Poland, Switzerland, Baleares, France, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Romania, Turkey-in-Europe, Yugoslavia, Belarus, Baltic States, Krym, Central European Russia, East European Russia, South European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ukraine, Algeria, Tunisia, Burkina, Gambia, The, Guinea-Bissau, Nigeria, Central African Republic, Cameroon, Congo, Gabon, Zaïre, Chad, Sudan, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Angola, Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, KwaZulu-Natal, Altay, Buryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, West Siberia, Amur, Khabarovsk, Primorye, Kazakhstan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Iran, China South-Central, Hainan, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, China North-Central, China Southeast, Tibet, Xinjiang, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Assam, Bangladesh, East Himalaya, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, West Himalaya, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam, Jawa, Philippines, Sumatera· introduced: Nansei-shoto, Québec, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode I., Vermont, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, District of Columbia
Extinct inSweden, Spain· recorded as extinct by WCVP: history, not habitat; no records are tested against these regions
Kew's description“hydroannual” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker46.731, 4.512 · in the densest population, 266 records (28% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 965 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 643 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 39 km away. 775 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 42 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 965 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Trapa natansTrapa natansTrapa natansTrapa natansTrapa natansTrapa natansTrapa natansTrapa natans

Photographs: (c) Mark Apgar, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Catherine Faber, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Jeff Clark, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Marcus Rosten, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2).

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 Trapa natans, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Adsorptive removal of Cr (VI) by Fe-modified activated carbon prepared from Trapa natans husk
Weifeng Liu, Jian Zhang, Chenglu Zhang, Yifu Wang (2010) · Chemical Engineering Journal
Epiphytic algae and macroinvertebrates on submerged and floating‐leaved macrophytes in an Italian lake
Antonella Cattaneo, Gaetano Galanti, Silvia Gentinetta, And Susana (1998) · Freshwater Biology
CONTRASTING IMPACTS OF A NATIVE AND ALIEN MACROPHYTE ON DISSOLVED OXYGEN IN A LARGE RIVER
Nina F. Caraco, Jonathan J. Cole (2002) · Ecological Applications
In vitro antimicrobial activity of Trapa natans L. fruit rind extracted in different solvents
Jigna Parekh, Sumitra Chanda (2007) · AFRICAN JOURNAL OF BIOTECHNOLOGY
Adsorptive removal of rhodamine B from textile wastewater using water chestnut (Trapa natans L.) peel: adsorption dynamics and kinetic studies
Tabrez Alam Khan, Momina Nazir, Equbal A. Khan (2013) · Toxicological & Environmental Chemistry Reviews
Drying and rehydration characteristics of water chestnut (Trapa natans) as a function of drying air temperature
Gagan Deep Singh, Rajiv Sharma, A. S. Bawa, D. C. Saxena (2007) · Journal of Food Engineering
Invertebrate communities associated with a native (Vallisneria americana) and an alien (Trapa natans) macrophyte in a large river
David L. Strayer, Colleen Lutz, Heather M. Malcom, Krista Munger (2003) · Freshwater Biology
Physico-chemical, morphological and pasting properties of starches extracted from water Chestnuts (Trapa natans) from three Lakes of Kashmir, India
Adil Gani, Sham Sul Haq, F.A. Masoodi, AA Broadway (2010) · Brazilian Archives of Biology and Technology
Green synthesis of silver nanoparticles using Trapa natans extract and their anticancer activity against A431 human skin cancer cells
Mohaddeseh Mahmoudi Saber, Seyed Bashir Mirtajani, Katayoon Karimzadeh (2018) · Journal of Drug Delivery Science and Technology
Review of World literature on Water Chestnut with implications for management in North America
Meredith Hummel, Erik Kiviat (2004) · AquaDocs (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization)

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.

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 162 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.