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An example collection, so you can see what this page does. Nothing added here is kept: leaving deletes it.
Bursera graveolens; photograph (c) Nathaniel Isabella, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Nathaniel Isabella, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2024-05-07

Bursera graveolens (Kunth) Triana & Planch.

Incense tree

Burseraceae · Mexico Central, Mexico Northeast +14

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Bursera graveolens, photograph (c) Naji Love, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bursera graveolens, photograph (c) Naji Love, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bursera graveolens, photograph (c) Naji Love, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bursera graveolens, photograph (c) Naji Love, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bursera graveolens, photograph (c) Naji Love, some rights reserved (CC BY)Bursera graveolens, photograph (c) Lucero Luna Montilla, some rights reserved (CC BY) 57 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
14.4°C
Record low 10.4 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
28°C
Mar, Apr, May and Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,252mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
31–39DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in the habitat's months, not shifted
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
A sharp rainy season, March to April and June to October (the habitat's months, not shifted), in a year of even temperature. rain rule, CHELSA
Not shifted: the shift rule does not apply to this habitat. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Bursera graveolens, known in Spanish as palo santo ('sacred wood'), is a species of wild tree in the family Burseraceae. It is native to Mexico, Central America, northwestern South America from Venezuela to Peru, and the Galápagos Islands.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Bursera graveolens", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Bursera

Bursera is a genus with about 100 described species of flowering shrubs and trees varying in size up to 25 m (82 ft) high. It is the type genus for Burseraceae. The trees are native to the Americas, from the southern United States south through to northern Argentina, in tropical and warm temperate forest habitats. More on Wikipedia ›

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Bursera", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the median year's rain (924 mm of 1,292 mm) falls in March to April and June to October. The temperature curve is flat, 2.6 °C between the warmest and coldest month, so the growing-season rule does not infer a growing season from it. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere. The habitat lies within 10° of the equator, where the shift rule does not apply, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.

Rain

1,292 mm in the median year at the habitat, 924 mm of it March to April and June to October. Wettest month September at 188 mm, driest month November at 60 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 756 mm to 2,248 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,252 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,292 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 31 to 39 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 25, the highest 90th-percentile month 44).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is 14.4 °C, the absolute minimum 10.4 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 41.7 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 20.6 °C in September (across the grid cells of the range 17.1 °C to 25.0 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 27.7 °C in April (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: 14.4 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 64 to 66% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected -43 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Bursera graveolens through the yearWarmest months March, April, May and August, mean daily high 28 °C; coldest month September, mean nightly low 20.6 °C; 1,292 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.0°10°20°30°40°50°41.7° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER10.4° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250300mm rainDLI 31–39RH 64–66%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 71 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C26 / 24–3027 / 25–3028 / 26–3028 / 26–3128 / 25–3127 / 24–3027 / 23–3128 / 22–3127 / 22–3027 / 22–2926 / 23–2927 / 24–29
Night °C21 / 17–2422 / 17–2522 / 18–2523 / 18–2523 / 19–2522 / 18–2521 / 17–2521 / 17–2521 / 17–2521 / 18–2521 / 18–2421 / 17–23
Rain mm67 / 8–22784 / 10–265114 / 8–258121 / 20–22286 / 42–288129 / 17–242121 / 10–261145 / 5–230188 / 11–268106 / 17–28960 / 20–22771 / 14–141
DLI33 / 27–3936 / 30–4237 / 33–4439 / 32–4337 / 31–4136 / 30–3936 / 31–4237 / 34–4136 / 32–4034 / 30–4231 / 27–4031 / 25–38
RH %65 / 57–6964 / 56–6964 / 57–6966 / 59–7166 / 60–7066 / 62–6865 / 60–6865 / 60–6865 / 62–6965 / 60–6965 / 60–6965 / 60–68
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 71 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (446 records in those cells; 2 more cells hold records but no land by the elevation layer, so those records sit at sea and the cells are left out), with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 1435:1733 (18.225, -93.325). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 10.4 °C, 1st-percentile night 14.4 °C, 99th-percentile day 41.7 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 71 distinct grid cells holding 446 of the 449 in-range records (2 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1435:1733 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 18.00_-93.125, lapse-corrected -43 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 8 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeMexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Southwest, Mexico Southeast, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Southwest Caribbean, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Galápagos, Peru · introduced: Cuba · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker6.837, -75.857 · in the densest population, 367 records (67% of those in range)
Kew's description“shrub or tree” · “seasonally dry tropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 544 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 446 of them in the land cells it reads, of 449 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 460 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker in the same place. 1 record outside the WCVP native range not used. 95 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 544 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Bursera graveolens, photograph 1did not loadBursera graveolens, photograph 2did not loadBursera graveolens, photograph 3did not loadBursera graveolens, photograph 4did not loadBursera graveolens, photograph 5did not loadBursera graveolens, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Naji Love, some rights reserved (CC BY) (5); (c) Lucero Luna Montilla, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Biophytum fruticosum Oxalidaceae Cestrum alternifolium Alternateleaf jessamine Plumeria pudica Plumeria pudica Hammerleaf Frangipani Photo: CC BY, Hudson Alves PintoThunbergia erecta Thunbergia erecta Bush clockvine Photo: CC BY, EthanZanthoxylum schreberi Zanthoxylum schreberi Yellow prickle Photo: CC0, author not statedVarronia polycephala Varronia polycephala Black-sage Photo: CC BY, Guillaume Delaitre

Other Bursera 26 in the reference

Bursera bipinnata Bursera bipinnata Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, José Javier Barrios FloresBursera copallifera Bursera copallifera Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, José Javier Barrios FloresBursera cuneata Bursera cuneata Burseraceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Oscar Alejandro Morales JuárezBursera epinnata Bursera epinnata Southern Elephant Tree Photo: CC BY, Abraham Sánchez RomeroBursera excelsa Bursera excelsa Burseraceae Photo: CC0, author not statedBursera exequielii Bursera exequielii Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, Abraham Sánchez RomeroBursera fagaroides Bursera fagaroides Elephant Tree Photo: CC BY, Abraham Sánchez RomeroBursera filicifolia Bursera filicifolia Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, MarvalPhotography19Bursera galeottiana Bursera galeottiana Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, Carlos Domínguez-RodríguezBursera glabrifolia Bursera glabrifolia Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, Carlos Domínguez-RodríguezBursera grandifolia Bursera grandifolia Burseraceae Photo: CC BY, Xavier Alejandro Caratachea NavarroBursera hindsiana Bursera hindsiana Red Elephant Tree Photo: CC BY, Abraham Sánchez Romero all 27 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Bursera graveolens var. graveolens. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Burseraceae
Described by
(Kunth) Triana & Planch.
Native to
Mexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Gulf +13
Wild records
544 in range · 460 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-21
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-21names fetched 2026-10-21
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 3 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (2 at a herbarium, 1 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-21
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-21NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 18.00_-93.125, lapse-corrected -43 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-21
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-21
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 54 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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