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Coleus rotundifolius; photograph Viswaprabha, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SAViswaprabha, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Coleus rotundifolius (Poir.) A.Chev. & Perrot

Chinese-potato; Hausa-potato; Madagascar-potato; Salaga-potato

Lamiaceae · India, Sri Lanka +7

No habitat climate
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Coleus rotundifolius, photograph Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsColeus rotundifolius, photograph Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsColeus rotundifolius, photograph Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsColeus rotundifolius, photograph Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsColeus rotundifolius, photograph Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsColeus rotundifolius, photograph Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons 12 photographs ›

Summary

Coleus rotundifolius, synonyms Plectranthus rotundifolius and Solenostemon rotundifolius, commonly known as native potato or country potato in Africa and called Chinese potato in India, is a perennial herbaceous plant of the mint family (Lamiaceae) native to tropical Africa. It is cultivated for its edible tubers primarily in West Africa, as well as more recently in parts of Asia, especially India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Indonesia.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Coleus rotundifolius", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Coleus

Coleus is a genus of annual or perennial herbs or shrubs, sometimes succulent, sometimes with a fleshy or tuberous rootstock, found in the Afro-Eurasia tropics and subtropics.

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

Cultivation

Nothing derived: no habitat climate for this species.

Climate across the habitat

No habitat climate can be derived: 7 in-range records, none placed to within 10 km. 7 of the 7 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or to no stated accuracy and fewer than three decimals or by something other than a person's observation, and cannot place a climate cell, though they count for the map and its marker.

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeIndia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam, Jawa, Malaya, Maluku, Philippines, Sumatera · introduced: Benin, Burkina, Ghana, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Senegal, Togo, Central African Republic, Congo, Gabon, Gulf of Guinea Is., Kenya, Zambia, Zimbabwe, KwaZulu-Natal, Northern Provinces, Mauritius, Madagascar · 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).
Kew's description“subshrub or tuberous geophyte” · “seasonally dry tropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 7 georeferenced records inside the native range, all openly licensed and shown on the map. 24 records outside the WCVP native range not used. Under a dozen records behind the map. No climate across the range is derived for this species. 7 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.
Other GBIF keysRecords also from GBIF's key 10877069 (Coleus rotundifolius (Poir.) M.R.Almeida, 2003): Kew's file holds it as Coleus rotundifolius (Poir.) A.Chev. & Perrot (accepted); 0 records, from GBIF's search API on the day of the build.

Photographs

Coleus rotundifolius, photograph 1did not loadColeus rotundifolius, photograph 2did not loadColeus rotundifolius, photograph 3did not loadColeus rotundifolius, photograph 4did not loadColeus rotundifolius, photograph 5did not loadColeus rotundifolius, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: Manojk, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (6).

Other Coleus 37 in the reference

Coleus aegyptiacus Lamiaceae Coleus aliciae Kentani Hullwort Coleus alloplectus Coleus alloplectus Narrow-leaved coleus Photo: CC BY, Lucas ChristofidesColeus amboinicus Coleus amboinicus Cuban oregano Photo: CC0, author not stated Coleus arabicus Lamiaceae Coleus argentatus Coleus argentatus Silver spurflower Photo: CC BY, Thomas MesaglioColeus australis Coleus australis Cockspur flower Photo: CC BY-SA, Greg TasneyColeus barbatus Coleus barbatus Abyssinian Coleus Photo: CC BY, Dave RichardsonColeus bellus Coleus bellus Mount Carbine Hullwort Photo: CC BY-SA, Craig FranklinColeus bojeri Coleus bojeri Lamiaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedColeus caninus Coleus caninus Dog Hullwort Photo: CC0, author not statedColeus comosus Coleus comosus Lamiaceae Photo: CC BY, Presha Soogrim all 38 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Calchas parviflorus; Coleus dysentericus; Coleus pallidiflorus; Coleus parviflorus; Coleus rehmannii and 14 more. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipedia

The record

Family
Lamiaceae
Described by
(Poir.) A.Chev. & Perrot
Native to
India, Sri Lanka, Thailand +6
Wild records
7 in range · 7 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 answeredasked 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 0 records of GBIF's key 10877069, Coleus rotundifolius (Poir.) M.R.Almeida, 2003 (Kew's file holds it as Coleus rotundifolius (Poir.) A.Chev. & Perrot (accepted)): GBIF occurrence search API
Habitat climate climate nothing to reportasked 2026-10-217 in-range records, none placed to within 10 km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21IPNI and POWO linked by Kew's number for Coleus rotundifolius (Poir.) A.Chev. & Perrot (the item's: IPNI 77108382-1, POWO 446145-1)
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-21
iNaturalist taxon inat.taxon not asked
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild not asked
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media nothing to reportasked 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 12 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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