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Ilex perado; photograph (c) jeanjacquesgodon, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) jeanjacquesgodon, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-05-19

Ilex perado Aiton

Madeira holly; Macaronesian Holly; Azorean holly

Aquifoliaceae · Azores, Canary Is. +1

Cited as Kew's World Checklist cites it, Ilex perado Aiton: GBIF's backbone key for this page carries the name with another author, Sol. ex Aiton.

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Ilex perado, photograph (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ilex perado, photograph (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ilex perado, photograph (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ilex perado, photograph (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ilex perado, photograph (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY)Ilex perado, photograph (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY) 58 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Coldest month, mean nightly low
12.6°C
Feb at the habitat, not a floor; extremes not used (sea cell) CHELSA
Warmest month, mean daily high
22°C
Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,313mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
12–43DLI
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 winters: the rain comes September to March, read as a winter growing season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Ilex perado, the Macaronesian holly, is a species of holly endemic to Macaronesia, distributed throughout the Azores, Madeira and Canary islands. It is an important component of the natural high-altitude Macaronesian rainforest, known as 'laurisilva', found mostly at 500 to 1,200 m (1,640 to 3,937 ft) altitude but it also appears in forest formations at lower elevation. Many of the subspecies have been classified as threatened, probably because of very small population sizes, and are protected by local, national and regional legislation.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Ilex perado", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Ilex

Ilex or holly is a genus of over 570 species of flowering plants in the family Aquifoliaceae, and the only living genus in that family. Ilex has the most species of any woody dioecious angiosperm genus. The species are evergreen or deciduous trees, shrubs, and climbers from tropics to temperate zones worldwide. More on Wikipedia ›

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

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads a winter growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (960 mm of 1,296 mm) falls in September to March, cooler than the year (wet-season mean 15.8 °C against a yearly mean of 16.6 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: March to September.

Rain

1,296 mm in the median year at the habitat, 960 mm of it September to March. Wettest month December at 181 mm, driest month July at 37 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 476 mm to 1,986 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,313 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,296 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: 12 to 43 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 10, the highest 90th-percentile month 47).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 12.6 °C in February (across the grid cells of the range 9.7 °C to 13.9 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 22.2 °C in August (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is 12.6 °C, the coldest month's mean nightly low, February, in the median year (CHELSA); a month's mean of its nightly lows is warmer than the nights a floor is read from. The daily extremes were read at a weather cell that is mostly sea and are not used.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 64 to 68% 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. CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. No cold floor is read without a daily extremes series; the coldest month's mean nightly low named in its sentence is not one. 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 Ilex perado through the yearWarmest month August, mean daily high 22 °C; coldest month February, mean nightly low 12.6 °C; 1,296 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.5°10°15°20°25°°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250300mm rainDLI 12–43RH 64–68%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 132 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C15 / 13–1614 / 12–1615 / 13–1615 / 13–1616 / 15–1819 / 17–2021 / 20–2222 / 21–2321 / 20–2219 / 17–2117 / 15–1916 / 13–17
Night °C13 / 10–1413 / 10–1413 / 10–1413 / 11–1515 / 12–1617 / 15–1819 / 18–2020 / 18–2220 / 17–2118 / 15–1915 / 13–1714 / 11–15
Rain mm122 / 67–230124 / 68–224133 / 58–19492 / 31–15286 / 14–11864 / 8–9037 / 5–5157 / 6–71109 / 17–137141 / 55–221150 / 76–250181 / 107–299
DLI13 / 11–1919 / 16–2526 / 24–3434 / 32–4040 / 38–4542 / 41–4643 / 42–4739 / 38–4331 / 29–3621 / 19–2815 / 13–2112 / 10–17
RH %65 / 61–7064 / 61–7065 / 61–7065 / 62–7066 / 62–7167 / 62–7268 / 61–7367 / 61–7266 / 62–7165 / 61–7164 / 61–7065 / 61–70

The daily extremes were read at a NASA POWER cell that is 32% land: neither it nor the next candidates whose coldest month's mean nightly low is within 2 °C of the median across cells sit in a POWER cell that is mostly land, and the rule reads a cold floor only from a cell that is mostly land, so none is read for this species. Nor is the coldest month's mean nightly low taken as one: it is a mean of a month's lows, not its coldest night. What that cell gave over 44 years: absolute minimum 6.3 °C, 1st-percentile night 8.9 °C, 99th-percentile day 22.6 °C.

How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 132 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (1553 records in those cells; 5 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 1027:3038 (38.625, -28.075). 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 132 distinct grid cells holding 1553 of the 1564 in-range records (5 further cells with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1027:3038 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells, though its NASA POWER cell is only 32% land and none of the 11 next candidates within 2 °C of the median was mostly land); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 38.50_-28.125, lapse-corrected +394 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 454 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.
NativeAzores, Canary Is., Madeira · 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 marker38.537, -28.328 · in the densest population, 944 records (59% of those in range)
Kew's description“tree” · “subtropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 1591 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 1553 of them in the land cells it reads, of 1564 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 1376 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker in the same place. 20 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 27 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 1591 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Ilex perado, photograph 1did not loadIlex perado, photograph 2did not loadIlex perado, photograph 3did not loadIlex perado, photograph 4did not loadIlex perado, photograph 5did not loadIlex perado, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski, some rights reserved (CC BY) (6).

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

Hypericum foliosum Hypericum foliosum Hypericaceae Photo: CC BY, Michael, Antoni and Nihat HinczewskiJuniperus brevifolia Juniperus brevifolia Azores Juniper Photo: CC BY, Michael, Antoni and Nihat HinczewskiLuzula purpureosplendens Luzula purpureosplendens Azorean Woodrush Photo: CC BY, Michael, Antoni and Nihat HinczewskiVaccinium cylindraceum Vaccinium cylindraceum Azorean Bilberry Photo: CC BY, Michael, Antoni and Nihat HinczewskiDiplazium caudatum Diplazium caudatum Caudate twinsorus fern Photo: CC BY, Dirk SchifflerLaurus azorica Laurus azorica Macaronesian Laurel Photo: CC BY, Michael, Antoni and Nihat Hinczewski

Other Ilex 63 in the reference

Ilex ambigua Ilex ambigua Aquifoliaceae Photo: CC BY, Shelby Lyn SandersIlex amelanchier Ilex amelanchier Sarvis holly Photo: CC BY-SA, Jeff NiznikIlex aquifolium Ilex aquifolium English holly Photo: CC BY, Nick ButcherIlex asprella Ilex asprella Rough-leaved Holly Photo: CC BY, Zheng-An WangIlex × attenuata Ilex × attenuata Topel holly Photo: CC BY, Cedar WoodIlex bioritsensis Ilex bioritsensis Aquifoliaceae Photo: CC BY, crothfelsIlex canariensis Ilex canariensis Small-leaved holly Photo: CC0, author not statedIlex cassine Ilex cassine Dahoon Photo: CC BY-SA, Douglas Goldman Ilex chapaensis Aquifoliaceae Ilex chinensis Ilex chinensis Aquifoliaceae Photo: CC BY, りなべるIlex cinerea Ilex cinerea Aquifoliaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedIlex colchica Ilex colchica Black Sea Holly Photo: CC BY, Азат Кадиров all 64 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Ilex maderiensis. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Aquifoliaceae
Described by
Aiton
Native to
Azores, Canary Is., Madeira
Wild records
1591 in range · 1376 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 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22GBIF's key 9278245 is Ilex perado Sol. ex Aiton; the page links Kew's Ilex perado Aiton, and the name is cited as Kew cites it
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
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; 2 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (2 at a botanic garden or arboretum; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-22
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 38.50_-28.125, lapse-corrected +394 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: NASA POWER's cell is mostly sea (32% land), so no cold floor is shown
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22found by its label; its IPNI identifier 83622-1 is Kew's for Ilex perado Aiton
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
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 2026-10-22
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 37 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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