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Clusia hilariana; photograph (c) Pablo Cauã da Silva Toledo, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Pablo Cauã da Silva Toledo, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2025-10-24

Clusia hilariana Schltdl.

Clusiaceae · Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast · listed by its genus as a tropical foliage plant

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Clusia hilariana, photograph (c) Henrique Bitencourt, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)Clusia hilariana, photograph (c) Henrique Bitencourt, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)Clusia hilariana, photograph (c) Pablo Cauã da Silva Toledo, some rights reserved (CC BY)Clusia hilariana, photograph (c) Pablo Cauã da Silva Toledo, some rights reserved (CC BY)Clusia hilariana, photograph (c) Gabriel Jovêncio Ribeiro, some rights reserved (CC BY)Clusia hilariana, photograph (c) Gabriel Jovêncio Ribeiro, some rights reserved (CC BY) 15 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
16.7°C
Record low 14.4 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
28°C
Jan, Feb and Mar at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,267mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
23–41DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in your months, northern hemisphere
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
Wet summers: the rain comes April to October (October to April at the habitat), read as a summer growing season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

About the genus · Clusia

Clusia is the type genus of the flowering plant family Clusiaceae. Comprising 300-400 species, it is native to the Neotropics. The genus is named by Carl Linnaeus in honor of the botanist Carolus Clusius.

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

Cultivation

Grouped as a tropical foliage plant, listed under the genus Clusia in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “shrub or tree”, “seasonally dry tropical”.

Seasons

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (917 mm of 1,192 mm) falls in October to April, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 25.1 °C against a yearly mean of 23.9 °C). Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere; shifted six months for a northern-hemisphere collection: April to October.

Rain

1,192 mm in the median year at the habitat, 917 mm of it October to April. Wettest month November at 168 mm, driest month August at 40 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 904 mm to 1,603 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,267 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,192 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, southern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 23 to 41 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 23, the highest 90th-percentile month 43).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is 16.7 °C, the absolute minimum 14.4 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 34.0 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 19.0 °C in July (across the grid cells of the range 14.8 °C to 20.4 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 28.1 °C in February (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: 16.7 °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: 63 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 -65 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.

Group. Listed under the genus Clusia in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “shrub or tree”, “seasonally dry tropical”. A group is taken only where Kew's description of the species agrees with the table's listing. The table gives no figure and no prose; the cold floor is the habitat's alone.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, southern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Clusia hilariana through the yearWarmest months January, February and March, mean daily high 28 °C; coldest month July, mean nightly low 19.0 °C; 1,192 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, southern hemisphere.10°15°20°25°30°35°34.0° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER14.4° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250mm rainDLI 23–41RH 63–66%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 21 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 °C28 / 27–2928 / 28–2928 / 27–2827 / 26–2725 / 24–2624 / 23–2524 / 23–2424 / 23–2524 / 24–2525 / 25–2626 / 25–2727 / 26–28
Night °C24 / 20–2424 / 20–2524 / 20–2423 / 19–2421 / 17–2220 / 15–2119 / 15–2019 / 15–2020 / 16–2121 / 18–2222 / 19–2323 / 20–24
Rain mm144 / 105–20494 / 56–124133 / 95–174100 / 76–12962 / 48–8347 / 32–6148 / 33–6840 / 28–6878 / 54–92111 / 87–136168 / 128–217167 / 145–243
DLI40 / 38–4241 / 40–4335 / 34–3630 / 29–3125 / 24–2623 / 23–2424 / 23–2428 / 27–2931 / 29–3234 / 33–3636 / 34–3838 / 37–39
RH %66 / 64–7066 / 63–6966 / 65–6965 / 64–6664 / 63–6564 / 62–6663 / 62–6663 / 61–6663 / 61–6564 / 62–6665 / 64–6866 / 64–69
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 21 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (33 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 2245:2767 (-22.275, -41.625). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 14.4 °C, 1st-percentile night 16.7 °C, 99th-percentile day 34.0 °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 21 distinct grid cells holding 33 of the 36 in-range records (2 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 2245:2767 (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 -22.50_-41.875, lapse-corrected -65 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 4 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.
NativeBrazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast · 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 marker-20.603, -40.425 · in the densest population, 138 records (74% 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 187 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 33 of them in the land cells it reads, of 36 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 165 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 19 km away. 4 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 151 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 inside the densest 2° block of the 187 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Clusia hilariana, photograph 1did not loadClusia hilariana, photograph 2did not loadClusia hilariana, photograph 3did not loadClusia hilariana, photograph 4did not loadClusia hilariana, photograph 5did not loadClusia hilariana, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Henrique Bitencourt, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (2); (c) Pablo Cauã da Silva Toledo, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Gabriel Jovêncio Ribeiro, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2).

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

Pilosocereus arrabidae Pilosocereus arrabidae Cactaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedVriesea neoglutinosa Vriesea neoglutinosa Bromeliaceae Photo: CC BY, fmunozEugenia selloi Eugenia selloi Myrtaceae Photo: CC BY, Bárbara VerdinhaNeoregelia cruenta Neoregelia cruenta Bromeliaceae Photo: CC BY, Bárbara VerdinhaAllagoptera arenaria Allagoptera arenaria Beach Coconut Photo: CC0, author not statedAnthurium parasiticum Anthurium parasiticum Araceae Photo: CC BY, Fabricio Carvalho da Silva

Other Clusia 23 in the reference

Clusia alata Clusiaceae Clusia articulata Clusiaceae Clusia criuva Clusia criuva Clusiaceae Photo: CC BY, LPBClusia croatii Clusia croatii Clusiaceae Photo: CC BY, Dick Culbert from Gibsons, B.C., CanadaClusia elliptica Clusia elliptica Clusiaceae Photo: CC BY, Nicolás Baresch Uribe Clusia ellipticifolia Clusiaceae Clusia flava Clusia flava Clusiaceae Photo: CC0, Quentin GroomClusia fluminensis Clusia fluminensis Clusiaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedClusia grandiflora Clusia grandiflora Clusiaceae Photo: CC BY, fmunozClusia guatemalensis Clusia guatemalensis Clusiaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedClusia lanceolata Clusia lanceolata Red-heart porcelain flower Photo: CC BY, Pablo Cauã da Silva Toledo Clusia magnifolia Clusiaceae all 24 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Clusia hilariana subsp. hilariana; Clusia lhotzkyana. (GBIF Backbone)

Under another author Clusia rosea Cambess. is an older name of this species, not Clusia rosea, a species of the reference. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataiNaturalist

The record

Family
Clusiaceae
Described by
Schltdl.
Native to
Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast
Wild records
187 in range · 165 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
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-21
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-21NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell -22.50_-41.875, lapse-corrected -65 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21
Wikipedia wikipedia nothing to reportasked 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
Wikimedia Commons commons 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 39 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

Opening your plants…