19 photographs › At a glance
- Jan
- Feb
- Mar
- Apr
- May
- Jun, shaded
- Jul, shaded
- Aug, shaded
- Sep, shaded
- Oct, shaded
- Nov, shaded
- Dec
From few records: 3 records in 3 grid cells. The records.
Summary
Piper retrofractum, the Balinese long pepper or Javanese long pepper, is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. This species is native to Java island in Indonesia.
Quoted from Wikipedia, "Piper retrofractum", CC BY-SA 4.0.
Cultivation
Grouped as a tropical foliage plant, listed under the family Piperaceae in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “liana”, “wet tropical”.
Seasons
The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the median year's rain (2,170 mm of 2,784 mm) falls in June to November. The temperature curve is flat, 2.1 °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 temperature curve moves under 4 °C between the warmest and coldest month, where the shift rule does not apply, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.
Rain
2,784 mm in the median year at the habitat, 2,170 mm of it June to November. Wettest month July at 416 mm, driest month February at 44 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 2,666 mm to 3,274 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 2,689 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 2,784 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: 27 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 26, the highest 90th-percentile month 44).
Warmth and air
Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 25.1 °C in January and February (across the grid cells of the range 20.5 °C to 25.8 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 28.4 °C in May (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is 25.1 °C, the coldest month's mean nightly low, January and 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.
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. 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.
Group. Listed under the family Piperaceae in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “liana”, “wet 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
From few records: this habitat climate is read from 3 records in 3 grid cells; a page says so under 12 records or 5 cells, and shows the figures as read.
Habitat months, northern hemisphere
Mean daily high from 26 °C in Jan and Feb to 28 °C in Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct and Nov; mean nightly low from 25 °C in Jan and Feb to 27 °C in May and Jun. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low, centred on the 2 months in a row that tie for it. 2,784 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added), the wettest month Jul. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 3 habitat cells. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.
Figures by month
| Figure | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Day °C | 26 / 22–27 | 26 / 22–27 | 27 / 22–27 | 28 / 23–28 | 28 / 24–29 | 28 / 24–29 | 28 / 24–28 | 28 / 24–28 | 28 / 24–28 | 28 / 24–28 | 28 / 23–28 | 27 / 22–27 |
| Night °C | 25 / 21–26 | 25 / 21–26 | 26 / 21–26 | 26 / 22–27 | 27 / 22–27 | 27 / 22–27 | 26 / 22–26 | 26 / 22–26 | 26 / 22–26 | 26 / 22–26 | 26 / 22–27 | 26 / 21–26 |
| Rain mm | 76 / 30–139 | 44 / 20–86 | 49 / 21–83 | 58 / 41–88 | 212 / 186–223 | 377 / 349–403 | 416 / 398–510 | 367 / 340–497 | 390 / 364–467 | 353 / 272–444 | 267 / 140–401 | 175 / 94–307 |
| DLI | 30 / 28–34 | 35 / 33–38 | 40 / 39–43 | 43 / 42–44 | 39 / 38–39 | 34 / 32–35 | 32 / 29–33 | 32 / 29–34 | 32 / 29–33 | 32 / 28–33 | 29 / 27–32 | 27 / 26–31 |
| RH % | 64 / 62–70 | 64 / 62–68 | 64 / 62–66 | 64 / 62–65 | 64 / 63–66 | 65 / 65–69 | 66 / 65–69 | 66 / 66–69 | 66 / 66–70 | 65 / 64–71 | 65 / 63–71 | 64 / 62–71 |
The daily extremes were read at a NASA POWER cell that is 24% 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 22.8 °C, 1st-percentile night 24.4 °C, 99th-percentile day 31.4 °C.
How this section is made
Natural habitat
How this section is made
Photographs
Photographs: (c) insect ID, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Ian Cowie, some rights reserved (CC BY); author not stated, no rights reserved · CC0.
Related
Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.
Artocarpus treculianus Moraceae Photo: CC BY, 胡正恆(Jackson Hu)
Nepenthes abalata Nepenthaceae Photo: CC0, author not stated
Sterculia ceramica Malvaceae Photo: CC0, author not stated
Hoya cumingiana Apocynaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Engeser
Pandanus dubius Knob-fruited Screwpine Photo: CC BY, Gabriel
Artocarpus altilis Breadfruit Photo: CC BY, John BarklaOther Piper 44 in the reference
Piper aduncum Spiked pepper Photo: CC BY, Alexis López Hernández
Piper amalago Wall Purslane Photo: CC BY, avocat
Piper arboreum Tree pepper Photo: CC BY, Diogo Luiz
Piper artanthe Piperaceae Photo: CC BY, Nicolás Baresch Uribe
Piper auritum Vera Cruz pepper Photo: CC BY, T R Shankar Raman
Piper barbatum Piperaceae Photo: CC0, author not stated
Piper betle Betel pepper Photo: CC BY, 胡正恆(Jackson Hu)
Piper borbonense Madagascan Wild Pepper Photo: CC BY, yellowplant
Piper bredemeyeri Piperaceae Photo: CC BY, Arthur de Jesús Chavarría Pérez
Piper capense African long pepper Photo: CC BY, Shaun Swanepoel
Piper cernuum Piperaceae Photo: CC BY, Fabrício Mil Homens Riella
Piper consanguineum Piperaceae Photo: CC BY, Guillaume Delaitre all 45 ›Names & registers
Also known as Amalago antillana; Amalago malamiri; Chavica chaba; Chavica exasperata; Chavica labillardierei and 15 more. (GBIF Backbone)
Kew accepts as species of their own Piper exasperatum: older names in GBIF's record of this species that Kew's World Checklist accepts as other species. (WCVP, RBG Kew, file of 2026-06-04)
Under another author Piper longum Blume is an older name of this species, not Piper longum, a species of the reference. (GBIF Backbone)
The record
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 answeredasked 2026-10-22gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04gbif.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 zoo; Wikidata's list)climate answeredasked 2026-10-22climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 12.00_121.875, lapse-corrected -7 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: NASA POWER's cell is mostly sea (24% land), so no cold floor is shownwikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22inat.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 2026-10-22inat.photos.cultivated not askedgbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-22openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshotEvery 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 31 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.