Species
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Libidibia ferrea (Mart. ex Tul.) L.P.Queiroz

Brazilian ironwood, leopardtree

Climate known 70 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Libidibia ferrea, formerly Caesalpinia ferrea, and commonly known as Brazilian ironwood, leopardtree or jucá, is a tree found in Brazil.

Text from Wikipedia, “Libidibia ferrea”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Libidibia

Libidibia is a genus of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae. It includes seven species of trees and shrubs native to the tropical Americas, ranging from northern Mexico to northern Argentina. Typical habitats include seasonally-dry tropical forest and scrub, thorn forest, and savanna woodland. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Libidibia”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Fabaceae
Described by
(Mart. ex Tul.) L.P.Queiroz
Native to
Brazil Northeast
Wild records
1023 in range· 970 open

At a glance

Warmest month
33°C
Oct, mean day; nights 22 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
660mm/yr
7 wet months · peak Mar 143 mm (CHELSA)
Light
27–44DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: a sharp rainy season, January to May at the habitat (not shifted); the temperature curve is flat (3.6 °C of range), so no growing season is inferred. Habitat rain 660 mm a year, wettest March at 143 mm, driest September at 8 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 27 to 44 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 16.5 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Apuleia ferrea (Mart. ex Tul.) Baill.; Caesalpinia ferrea C.Mart.; Caesalpinia ferrea Mart. ex Tul.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a sharp rainy season, January to May at the habitat (not shifted); the temperature curve is flat (3.6 °C of range), so no growing season is inferred.

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the year's rain (493 mm of 660 mm) falls in January to May. The temperature curve is flat, 3.6 °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, southern hemisphere, within 10° of the equator; with no thermal season there there is no season to reverse, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: 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 gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 660 mm a year, wettest March at 143 mm, driest September at 8 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

660 mm a year at the habitat, 493 mm of it January to May. Wettest month March at 143 mm, driest September at 8 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 533 mm to 1352 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

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

Light Open sky over the habitat: 27 to 44 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 27 to 44 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 24, the highest 90th-percentile month 45).

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.

Warmth and air Cold floor 16.5 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is 16.5 °C, the absolute minimum 14.0 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 39.1 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 19.4 °C in August (across the envelope cells 16.9 °C to 22.8 °C), warmest day 32.7 °C in October (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 16.5 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 54 to 61% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 28 °C in Jul to 33 °C in Oct; mean night from 19 °C in Aug to 23 °C in Dec. The cold quarter, Jul to Sep, is the three months around the coldest night. 660 mm of rain a year, most in Mar. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 816 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 14.0 °C and the 99th-percentile day 39.1 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.10°15°20°25°30°35°40°45°39.1° 99th-percentile day (undated)14.0° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250300mm rainDLI 27–44RH 54–61 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 816 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C32 / 28–3331 / 28–3331 / 28–3230 / 28–3129 / 27–3128 / 26–3128 / 25–3229 / 26–3331 / 27–3433 / 29–3533 / 29–3532 / 29–34
Night °C23 / 20–2422 / 20–2422 / 20–2422 / 20–2422 / 19–2320 / 18–2320 / 17–2319 / 17–2320 / 18–2322 / 19–2422 / 20–2423 / 20–24
Rain mm84 / 46–16188 / 50–170143 / 84–256110 / 56–22268 / 16–16840 / 6–15324 / 3–13010 / 2–848 / 2–5012 / 3–5422 / 5–9651 / 25–133
DLI39 / 35–4139 / 35–4137 / 33–3934 / 31–3630 / 27–3327 / 24–3228 / 24–3533 / 28–3940 / 33–4344 / 38–4542 / 37–4540 / 37–43
RH %58 / 54–6459 / 55–6561 / 57–6661 / 58–6760 / 56–6660 / 54–6758 / 52–6657 / 50–6554 / 49–6354 / 49–6255 / 49–6256 / 51–63

Each figure is the median across the 816 grid cells holding the 1016 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 1959:2803 (-7.975, -39.825). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 14.0 °C, 1st-percentile night 16.5 °C, 99th-percentile day 39.1 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 816 distinct grid cells holding the 1016 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1959:2803 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell -8.00_-40.000, lapse-corrected -28 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 440 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 every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeBrazil Northeast· introduced: India, Pakistan, Malaya, New Guinea
Kew's description“shrub or tree” · “seasonally dry tropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker-7.944, -38.472 · in the densest population, 337 records (33% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1023 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 970 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 1 km away. 256 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 7 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 1023 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Libidibia ferreaLibidibia ferreaLibidibia ferreaLibidibia ferreaLibidibia ferreaLibidibia ferreaLibidibia ferreaLibidibia ferrea

Photographs: (c) André Ambrozio, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Eli, some rights reserved (CC BY) (5); (c) Tony Rebelo, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Libidibia ferrea, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Quantification of polyphenols and evaluation of antimicrobial, analgesic and anti-inflammatory activities of aqueous and acetone–water extracts of Libidibia ferrea, Parapiptadenia rigida and Psidium guajava
Aurigena Antunes de Araújo, Luiz Alberto Lira Soares, Magda Rhayanny Assunção Ferreira, Manoel André de Souza Neto (2014) · Journal of Ethnopharmacology
Wound dressings loaded with an anti-inflammatory jucá (Libidibia ferrea) extract using supercritical carbon dioxide technology
Ana M.A. Dias, Ana Rey‐Rico, Rute A. Oliveira, Sofia Marceneiro (2012) · The Journal of Supercritical Fluids
Biodiverse food plants in the semiarid region of Brazil have unknown potential: A systematic review
Michelle Cristine Medeiros Jacob, Maria Fernanda Araújo de Medeiros, Ulysses Paulino Albuquerque (2020) · PLoS ONE
Evaluation of the Folin-Ciocalteu Method and Quantification of Total Tannins in Stem Barks and Pods from Libidibia ferrea (Mart. ex Tul) L. P. Queiroz
Marcos A.M. Galvão, Alice Oliveira de Arruda, Isabelle Cristinne Ferraz Bezerra, Magda Rhayanny Assunção Ferreira (2018) · Brazilian Archives of Biology and Technology
Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi Increase the Phenolic Compounds Concentration in the Bark of the Stem of Libidibia Ferrea in Field Conditions
Emanuela Lima dos Santos, Francineyde Alves da Silva, Fábio Sérgio Barbosa da Silva (2017) · The Open Microbiology Journal
Antileishmanial activity of extracts from Libidibia ferrea: development of in vitro and in vivo tests
Claudia Dantas Comandolli Wyrepkowski, Bruno Bezerra Jensen, Andriy Grafov, Pierre Alexandre dos Santos (2017) · Acta Amazonica
Comparative analysis of the antioxidant and DNA protection capacities of Anadenanthera colubrina, Libidibia ferrea and Pityrocarpa moniliformis fruits
Luís Cláudio Nascimento da Silva, Carlos Alberto-Silva, Renata Maria de Souza, Alexandre José Macêdo (2011) · Food and Chemical Toxicology
ANTIFUNGAL POTENTIAL OF PLANT SPECIES FROM BRAZILIAN CAATINGA AGAINST DERMATOPHYTES
Renata Perugini Biasi-Garbin, Marcela de Oliveira Demitto, Renata Claro Ribeiro do Amaral, Magda Rhayanny Assunção Ferreira (2016) · Revista do Instituto de Medicina Tropical de São Paulo
Effect of water stress on seedling growth in two species with different abundances: the importance of Stress Resistance Syndrome in seasonally dry tropical forest
Wanessa Nepomuceno Ferreira, Claudivan Feitosa de Lacerda, Rafael Carvalho da Costa, Sebastião Medeiros Filho (2015) · Acta Botanica Brasilica
LIBIDIBIA FERREA: UMA REVISÃO ABRANGENTE E POTENCIAIS APLICAÇÕES DE DIFERENTES EXTRATOS DE JUCÁ
Clêrton Magno Rocha Santana Pereira, Samuel B. Santos, Mário Rodrigues Pereira da Silva, Maiana Silva Chaves (2026) · Revista Multidisciplinar do Nordeste Mineiro
Reproductive isolation between diploid and tetraploid cytotypes of Libidibia ferrea (= Caesalpinia ferrea) (Leguminosae): ecological and taxonomic implications
Laís Angélica Borges, Gustavo Souza, Marcelo Guerra, Isabel Cristina Machado (2012) · Plant Systematics and Evolution

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not asked
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 123 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.