Ficus luteaVahl

Lagos rubbertree

WFO wfo-0000689147 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Ficus lutea, photographed by Jean-Paul Boerekamps
fig. a Jean-Paul Boerekamps, CC0 1.0 / 2022-05-04 / obs. 199269352
Ficus lutea, photographed by Benjamin Fredlund
fig. b Benjamin Fredlund, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 177048243
Ficus lutea, photographed by Margaret Burger
fig. c Margaret Burger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 155463782
Ficus lutea, photographed by Margaret Burger
fig. d Margaret Burger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 147258393
Ficus lutea, photographed by Margaret Burger
fig. e Margaret Burger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 145640567
Ficus lutea, photographed by Margaret Burger
fig. f Margaret Burger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 134083057
Ficus lutea, photographed by Margaret Burger
fig. g Margaret Burger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 128227934
Ficus lutea, photographed by Suvarna Parbhoo Mohan
fig. h Suvarna Parbhoo Mohan, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 125844547

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 37 botanical countries

Regions where Ficus lutea is native: Aldabra, Angola, Benin, Burkina, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, DR Congo, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Gulf of Guinea Is., Ivory Coast, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe AngolaBeninBurkinaCameroonCentral African RepublicChadDR CongoEswatiniEthiopiaGabonGambiaGhanaGuineaGuinea-BissauGulf of Guinea Is.Ivory CoastKenyaKwaZulu-NatalLiberiaMadagascarMalawiMaliMozambiqueNigeriaRwandaSenegalSierra LeoneSomaliaTanzaniaTogoUgandaZambiaZimbabwe AldabraCape VerdeComorosSeychelles
Native distribution of Ficus lutea, 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
Aldabra ALD AFRICA
Angola ANG
Benin BEN
Burkina BKN
Cameroon CMN
Cape Verde CVI
Central African Republic CAF
Chad CHA
Comoros COM
DR Congo ZAI
Eswatini SWZ
Ethiopia ETH
Gabon GAB
Gambia GAM
Ghana GHA
Guinea GUI
Guinea-Bissau GNB
Gulf of Guinea Is. GGI
Ivory Coast IVO
Kenya KEN
KwaZulu-Natal NAT
Liberia LBR
Madagascar MDG
Malawi MLW
Mali MLI
Mozambique MOZ
Nigeria NGA
Rwanda RWA
Senegal SEN
Seychelles SEY
Sierra Leone SIE
Somalia SOM
Tanzania TAN
Togo TOG
Uganda UGA
Zambia ZAM
Zimbabwe ZIM

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 655 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 8.8 °C 14.5 °C 21.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 25.6 °C 26.7 °C 30.8 °C
Annual rainfall 649 mm 1,006 mm 1,829 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 11 mm 103 mm 254 mm

It is barely found anywhere that freezes. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 655 research-grade observations of Ficus lutea 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 28 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.

  • Ficus akaie De Wild.
  • Ficus apodocephala Baker
  • Ficus arimensis Britton
  • Ficus baronii Baker
  • Ficus cabrae Warb.
  • Ficus holstii Warb.
  • Ficus incognita De Wild.
  • Ficus kaba De Wild.
  • Ficus lanigera Warb.
  • Ficus nautarum Baker
  • Ficus nekbudu Warb.
  • Ficus neumanni Cels ex Kunth & C.D.Bouché
  • Ficus neumannii Kunth & Bouché
  • Ficus pseudovogelii Cheval.
  • Ficus quibeba Welw. ex Ficalho
  • Ficus senegalensis Miq.
  • Ficus subcalcarata Warb. & Schweinf
  • Ficus subcalcarata var. vestitobracteata (Warb.) Mildbr. & Burret
  • Ficus trichosphaera Baker
  • Ficus utilis Sim
  • Ficus verrucocarpa Warb.
  • Ficus vestito-bracteata Warb.
  • Ficus vogelii (Miq.) Miq.
  • Ficus vogelii var. pubicarpa Mildbr. & Burret

and 4 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.