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Vicia lens; photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIF CC0Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIF

Vicia lens (L.) Coss. & Germ.

Lentil; Cultivated lentil

Fabaceae · France, Spain +7

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Vicia lens, photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIFVicia lens, photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIFVicia lens, photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIFVicia lens, photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIFVicia lens, photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIFVicia lens, photograph Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIF 24 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-7.0°C
Record low -19.5 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
24°C
Jul and Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
834mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
8–39DLI
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
Rain spread: 70% of the median year's rain takes 8 months, so no short rainy season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

The lentil (Vicia lens or Lens culinaris) is an annual legume grown for its lens-shaped edible seeds or pulses, also called lentils. It is about 40 cm (16 in) tall, and the seeds grow in pods, usually with two seeds in each.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Lentil", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Vicia

Vicia is a genus of over 240 species of flowering plants that are part of the legume family (Fabaceae), and which are commonly known as vetches. Vicia species are native to Eurasia, Africa, and the Americas.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Vicia", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (577 mm of 809 mm) takes 8 months, September to January and April to June. Mean temperature moves 16.0 °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 October to December.

Rain

809 mm in the median year at the habitat, 577 mm of it September to January and April to June. Wettest month October at 84 mm, driest month February at 54 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 606 mm to 1,135 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 834 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 809 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: 8 to 39 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 5, the highest 90th-percentile month 48).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -7.0 °C, the absolute minimum -19.5 °C, 2,447 frost nights in 44 years, 55.6 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 28.9 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 0.9 °C in January and February (across the grid cells of the range -3.1 °C to 4.5 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 24.0 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -7.0 °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: 58 to 66% 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 +7 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.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Vicia lens through the yearWarmest months July and August, mean daily high 24 °C; coldest months January and February, mean nightly low 0.9 °C; 809 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.-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°frost28.9° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-19.5° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125mm rainDLI 8–39RH 58–66%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 185 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 °C6 / 4–118 / 5–1211 / 8–1614 / 11–1818 / 15–2121 / 19–2724 / 22–3024 / 21–2920 / 18–2516 / 13–2010 / 7–157 / 4–12
Night °C1 / -3–51 / -3–63 / -1–75 / 2–99 / 6–1312 / 9–1715 / 12–1914 / 12–2012 / 9–179 / 6–134 / 1–92 / -2–6
Rain mm68 / 53–9054 / 43–8156 / 41–8568 / 50–10072 / 49–11564 / 27–9160 / 11–8262 / 18–8769 / 44–11684 / 59–12577 / 53–11975 / 56–111
DLI9 / 6–1615 / 11–2223 / 18–3131 / 28–3835 / 33–4339 / 35–4739 / 34–4834 / 30–4226 / 21–3316 / 13–2410 / 7–168 / 5–13
RH %66 / 59–6863 / 59–6560 / 56–6360 / 56–6260 / 55–6159 / 52–6158 / 52–6158 / 53–6161 / 56–6364 / 58–6666 / 60–6966 / 60–70
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 185 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (199 records in those cells; 3 more cells hold records but no land by the elevation layer, so those records sit at sea and the cells are left out), 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 814:3640 (49.275, 2.025). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -19.5 °C, 1st-percentile night -7.0 °C, 99th-percentile day 28.9 °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 185 distinct grid cells holding 199 of the 202 in-range records (3 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 814:3640 (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 49.50_1.875, lapse-corrected +7 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 132 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.
NativeFrance, Spain, Algeria, Morocco, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, West Himalaya · introduced: Great Britain, Ireland, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Switzerland, Corse, Portugal, Sardegna, Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Kriti, Romania, Sicilia, Yugoslavia, Belarus, Baltic States, Krym, Central European Russia, East European Russia, North European Russia, South European Russia, Northwest European Russia, Ukraine, Libya, Tunisia, Azores, Canary Is., Madeira, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Mauritius, Réunion, Rodrigues, Altay, Krasnoyarsk, West Siberia, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Cyprus, East Aegean Is., Lebanon-Syria, Palestine, Turkey, Yemen, China South-Central, Inner Mongolia, China North-Central, China Southeast, Tibet, Xinjiang, Mongolia, Assam, Bangladesh, East Himalaya, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Jawa, New Guinea, Marianas, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Québec, Idaho, Washington, Illinois, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, California, Louisiana, Maryland, Colombia, Galápagos · 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 marker45.01, 3.952 · in the densest population, 209 records (36% of those in range)
Kew's description“scrambling annual or perennial” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 582 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 199 of them in the land cells it reads, of 202 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 547 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 1 km away. 763 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 380 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 582 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Vicia lens, photograph 1did not loadVicia lens, photograph 2did not loadVicia lens, photograph 3did not loadVicia lens, photograph 4did not loadVicia lens, photograph 5did not loadVicia lens, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: Piermario Maculan, CC0, iNaturalist via GBIF (6).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Kickxia spuria Kickxia spuria Round-leaved fluellen Photo: CC BY, Irina MitineCrepis setosa Crepis setosa Bristly hawk's-beard Photo: CC BY, LjažLysimachia foemina Lysimachia foemina Blue Pimpernel Photo: CC BY, Bobo-XDelphinium ajacis Delphinium ajacis Rocket larkspur Photo: CC BY, olmagonBryonia cretica Bryonia cretica Cretan bryony Photo: CC0, author not statedSetaria verticillata Setaria verticillata Rough bristle-grass Photo: CC BY, 祐

Other Vicia 33 in the reference

Vicia americana Vicia americana American vetch Photo: CC0, author not statedVicia benghalensis Vicia benghalensis Purple vetch Photo: CC BY, Jared Zachary HermanVicia bithynica Vicia bithynica Bithynian vetch Photo: CC BY, Barry StewartVicia caroliniana Vicia caroliniana Carolina vetch Photo: CC0, author not statedVicia cassubica Vicia cassubica Danzig vetch Photo: CC BY, Vladimír FukaVicia cracca Vicia cracca Tufted vetch Photo: CC BY-SA, Kevin DupuisVicia dumetorum Vicia dumetorum Fabaceae Photo: CC BY, LarsVicia eriocarpa Vicia eriocarpa Woolly Pod Vetch Photo: CC BY-SA, Tony RebeloVicia ervilia Vicia ervilia Bitter vetch Photo: CC BY, Marc RieraVicia faba Vicia faba Broad bean Photo: CC BY, Lorenzo Emanuele LabateVicia grandiflora Vicia grandiflora Large yellow vetch Photo: CC BY, NMichałowskaVicia hirsuta Vicia hirsuta Tiny vetch Photo: CC0, author not stated all 34 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Cicer lens; Ervum lens; Ervum orientalis; Lathyrus lens; Lens culinaris and 7 more. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipedia

The record

Family
Fabaceae
Described by
(L.) Coss. & Germ.
Native to
France, Spain, Algeria +6
Wild records
582 in range · 547 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; 33 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (23 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 8 at a herbarium, 2 at a zoo; 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 49.50_1.875, lapse-corrected +7 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22Wikipedia redirects Vicia lens to Lentil, whose Wikidata item (Q131226) is the taxon Lens culinaris, an older name of this species (Lens culinaris)
iNaturalist taxon inat.taxon not asked
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild not asked
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 117 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

Opening your plants…