Gardenia ternifoliaSchumach. & Thonn.

WFO wfo-0000971206 Accepted WFO 2026-06 4 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–d · 1 observation

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 1 time, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Gardenia ternifolia, photographed by Mahomed Desai
fig. a Mahomed Desai, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-03-07 / obs. 115642754
Gardenia ternifolia, photographed by Mahomed Desai
fig. b Mahomed Desai, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115642755
Gardenia ternifolia, photographed by Mahomed Desai
fig. c Mahomed Desai, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115642773
Gardenia ternifolia, photographed by Mahomed Desai
fig. d Mahomed Desai, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 115642786

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 34 botanical countries

Regions where Gardenia ternifolia is native: Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina, Burundi, Cabinda, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, DR Congo, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Northern Provinces, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Sudan-South Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe AngolaBeninBotswanaBurkinaBurundiCabindaCameroonCentral African RepublicChadCongoDR CongoEthiopiaGabonGambiaGhanaGuineaGuinea-BissauIvory CoastKenyaMalawiMaliMozambiqueNamibiaNigeriaNorthern ProvincesRwandaSenegalSierra LeoneSudan-South SudanTanzaniaTogoUgandaZambiaZimbabwe
Native distribution of Gardenia ternifolia, 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.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Angola ANG AFRICA
Benin BEN
Botswana BOT
Burkina BKN
Burundi BUR
Cabinda CAB
Cameroon CMN
Central African Republic CAF
Chad CHA
Congo CON
DR Congo ZAI
Ethiopia ETH
Gabon GAB
Gambia GAM
Ghana GHA
Guinea GUI
Guinea-Bissau GNB
Ivory Coast IVO
Kenya KEN
Malawi MLW
Mali MLI
Mozambique MOZ
Namibia NAM
Nigeria NGA
Northern Provinces TVL
Rwanda RWA
Senegal SEN
Sierra Leone SIE
Sudan-South Sudan SUD
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 86 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 10.9 °C 19.1 °C 20.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 28.0 °C 38.6 °C 39.8 °C
Annual rainfall 638 mm 1,018 mm 1,371 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 0 mm 2 mm 53 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 86 research-grade observations of Gardenia ternifolia 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 9 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.

  • Decameria jovis-tonantis Welw.
  • Gardenia asperula Stapf & Hutch.
  • Gardenia goetzei Stapf & Hutch.
  • Gardenia jovis-tonantis (Welw.) Hiern
  • Gardenia lutea Fresen.
  • Gardenia ternifolia var. jovis-tonantis (Welw.) Aubrév.
  • Gardenia triacantha DC.
  • Genipa jovis-tonantis (Welw.) Baill.
  • Randia torulosa K.Krause

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. 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.