Dieffenbachia seguine(Jacq.) Schott

dumbcane

WFO wfo-0000943374 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Jenny Saito
fig. a Jenny Saito, CC BY 4.0 / 2022-04-24 / obs. 190294964
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Ong Jyh Seng
fig. b Ong Jyh Seng, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 179921793
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by 葉子
fig. c 葉子, CC0 1.0 / obs. 177997587
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Michael Bakker Paiva
fig. d Michael Bakker Paiva, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 173200369
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Cheongweei Gan
fig. e Cheongweei Gan, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 171263780
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Zoltán Stekkelpak
fig. f Zoltán Stekkelpak, CC0 1.0 / obs. 170337252
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Helio Lourencini
fig. g Helio Lourencini, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 165147589
Dieffenbachia seguine, photographed by Ong Jyh Seng
fig. h Ong Jyh Seng, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 136694998

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 22 botanical countries

Regions where Dieffenbachia seguine is native: Bolivia, Brazil North, Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast, Brazil West-Central, Cayman Is., Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Leeward Is., Peru, Puerto Rico, Suriname, Trinidad-Tobago, Venezuela, Venezuelan Antilles, Windward Is. BoliviaBrazil NorthBrazil NortheastBrazil SoutheastBrazil West-CentralColombiaCubaDominican RepublicEcuadorFrench GuianaGuyanaHaitiJamaicaPeruPuerto RicoSurinameTrinidad-TobagoVenezuela Cayman Is.Leeward Is.Venezuelan AntillesWindward Is.
Native distribution of Dieffenbachia seguine, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Bolivia BOL SOUTHERN AMERICA
Brazil North BZN
Brazil Northeast BZE
Brazil Southeast BZL
Brazil West-Central BZC
Cayman Is. CAY
Colombia CLM
Cuba CUB
Dominican Republic DOM
Ecuador ECU
French Guiana FRG
Guyana GUY
Haiti HAI
Jamaica JAM
Leeward Is. LEE
Peru PER
Puerto Rico PUE
Suriname SUR
Trinidad-Tobago TRT
Venezuela VEN
Venezuelan Antilles VNA
Windward Is. WIN

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Where it actually grows measured, from 1,983 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 12.0 °C 20.7 °C 24.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 25.6 °C 29.6 °C 33.6 °C
Annual rainfall 1,051 mm 2,405 mm 4,108 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 26 mm 232 mm 625 mm

It is not found anywhere that gets close to freezing. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 1,983 research-grade observations of Dieffenbachia seguine that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 109 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Arum crudele Salisb.
  • Arum regnium Rodschied ex G.F.Mey.
  • Arum regnium Rodsch.
  • Arum seguine Jacq.
  • Arum seguinum L.
  • Caladium maculatum G.Lodd.
  • Caladium seguine (Jacq.) Vent.
  • Caladium seguine var. maculatum (G.Lodd.) Sims
  • Caladium seguinum Vent.
  • Dieffenbachia amabilis W.Bull
  • Dieffenbachia amazonica Mottet
  • Dieffenbachia amoena W.Bull
  • Dieffenbachia aureovariegata Anon.
  • Dieffenbachia barraquiniana Verschaff. & Lem.
  • Dieffenbachia brasiliensis H.J.Veitch
  • Dieffenbachia carderi W.Bull
  • Dieffenbachia chelsonii W.Bull ex T.Moore & Mast.
  • Dieffenbachia cognata Schott
  • Dieffenbachia consobrina Schott
  • Dieffenbachia conspurcata Schott
  • Dieffenbachia decora Engl.
  • Dieffenbachia delecta W.Bull
  • Dieffenbachia eburnea Van Geert
  • Dieffenbachia gigantea Verschaff. ex Regel

and 85 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.