Planchonella chartaceaH.J.Lam

WFO wfo-0000274081 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. a Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2022-04-17 / obs. 188697891
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. b Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 186696274
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. c Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 180139414
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. d Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 173961040
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. e Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 161843356
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. f Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 161448520
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. g Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 106630361
Planchonella chartacea, photographed by Greg Tasney
fig. h Greg Tasney, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 93710772

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 19 botanical countries

Regions where Planchonella chartacea is native: Borneo, Jawa, Lesser Sunda Is., Malaya, Maluku, New Guinea, Philippines, Solomon Is., Sulawesi, Sumatera, New South Wales, Queensland, Fiji, New Caledonia, Niue, Santa Cruz Is., Tonga, Vanuatu, Wallis-Futuna Is. BorneoJawaLesser Sunda Is.MalayaMalukuNew GuineaPhilippinesSolomon Is.SulawesiSumateraNew South WalesQueenslandFijiNew Caledonia NiueTongaVanuatuWallis-Futuna Is.
Native distribution of Planchonella chartacea, 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
Borneo BOR ASIA-TROPICAL
Jawa JAW
Lesser Sunda Is. LSI
Malaya MLY
Maluku MOL
New Guinea NWG
Philippines PHI
Solomon Is. SOL
Sulawesi SUL
Sumatera SUM
Fiji FIJ PACIFIC
New Caledonia NWC
Niue NUE
Santa Cruz Is. SCZ
Tonga TON
Vanuatu VAN
Wallis-Futuna Is. WAL
New South Wales NSW AUSTRALASIA
Queensland QLD

Not drawn on the map: Santa Cruz Is.. We hold no public-domain boundary for this region, so it is listed rather than guessed at.

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 95 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low 9.4 °C 12.4 °C 19.0 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 26.0 °C 27.7 °C 30.1 °C
Annual rainfall 1,334 mm 1,589 mm 2,037 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 94 mm 184 mm 230 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 95 research-grade observations of Planchonella chartacea 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 19 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.

  • Achras chartacea F.Muell. ex Benth.
  • Beccariella chartacea (F.Muell.) Aubrév.
  • Chrysophyllum curtisii King & Gamble
  • Lucuma discolor Baill.
  • Planchonella linggensis (Burck) Pierre
  • Planchonella linggensis var. vinicolorata P.Royen
  • Planchonella littoralis (Ridl.) H.J.Lam
  • Planchonella viridis Pierre
  • Pouteria chartacea (F.Muell. ex Benth.) Baehni
  • Pouteria discolor (Baill.) Baehni
  • Pouteria linggensis (Burck) Baehni
  • Sersalisia chartacea (F.Muell. ex Benth.) Domin
  • Sideroxylon albocostatum K.Krause
  • Sideroxylon chartaceum (Benth.) F.Muell.
  • Sideroxylon chartaceum (F.Muell. ex Benth.) Baehni
  • Sideroxylon chartaceum (F.Muell. ex Benth.) Benth. & Hook.f. ex F.Muell.
  • Sideroxylon linggense Burck
  • Sideroxylon littorale Ridl.
  • Sideroxylon pittosporifolium Elmer

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.