In this paper, the natural convection in a square enclosure with a rectangular heated cylinder is investigated via the lattice Boltzmann method. A detailed study is conducted on the effect of the cylinder width and the Rayleigh number on the fluid flow and heat transfer. The flow structures and heat transfer patterns are classified into eight buoyant regimes, i. e., four steady regimes, two periodic regimes, one multiple periodic regime, and one chaos regime, two of which are reported for the first time. © Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag 2009.