Species
+

Averrhoa bilimbi L.

Amrak, Belimbing, Bilimbi, Bilimbi

Climate known 64 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

Averrhoa bilimbi is a fruit-bearing tree of the genus Averrhoa, family Oxalidaceae. It is native to the Maluku Islands and Sulawesi in Indonesia, and has become naturalised and is common throughout Southeast Asia. It is cultivated in parts of tropical South Asia and the Americas. It bears edible but extremely sour fruit. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Averrhoa bilimbi”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Averrhoa

Averrhoa is a genus of understorey trees in the wood sorrel family Oxalidaceae. It includes four species native to Maritime Southeast Asia, Java, the Maluku Islands, New Guinea, and Sulawesi. The genus is named after Averroes, a 12th-century astronomer and philosopher from Al-Andalus.

Text from Wikipedia, “Averrhoa”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Oxalidaceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Maluku, Sulawesi
Wild records
23 in range· 14 open

At a glance

Warmest month
28°C
Apr, mean day; nights 25 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
2681mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jan 292 mm (CHELSA)
Light
31–39DLI
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: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (November to June at the habitat (not shifted)). Habitat rain 2681 mm a year, wettest January at 292 mm, driest August at 120 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 31 to 39 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 22.4 °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 Averrhoa abtusangulata Stokes; Averrhoa bilimbi f. papuana R.Knuth; Averrhoa obtusangula Stokes.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: no season, 70% of the rain takes 8 months (November to June at the habitat (not shifted)).

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

The rain rule reads no season: 70% of the year's rain (2074 mm of 2681 mm) takes 8 months, November to June. Mean temperature moves 1.1 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern 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 2681 mm a year, wettest January at 292 mm, driest August at 120 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

2681 mm a year at the habitat, 2074 mm of it November to June. Wettest month January at 292 mm, driest August at 120 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1813 mm to 4164 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern 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: 31 to 39 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 31 to 39 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 27, the highest 90th-percentile month 41).

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 22.4 °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 22.4 °C, the absolute minimum 19.9 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 35.2 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 23.9 °C in August (across the envelope cells 19.7 °C to 25.2 °C), warmest day 27.8 °C in April (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 22.4 °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: 65 to 69% 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 27 °C in Jul to 28 °C in Apr; mean night from 24 °C in Aug to 25 °C in Apr. The cold quarter, Jul to Sep, is the three months around the coldest night. 2681 mm of rain a year, most in Jan. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 20 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 19.9 °C and the 99th-percentile day 35.2 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.15°20°25°30°35°40°35.2° 99th-percentile day (undated)19.9° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 31–39RH 65–69 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 20 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 °C27 / 25–2827 / 25–2828 / 26–2928 / 26–2927 / 26–2927 / 26–2827 / 26–2827 / 26–2927 / 26–2928 / 26–2928 / 26–2927 / 26–29
Night °C25 / 21–2625 / 21–2625 / 21–2625 / 21–2625 / 21–2624 / 20–2524 / 20–2524 / 20–2524 / 20–2524 / 20–2625 / 21–2625 / 21–26
Rain mm292 / 167–491257 / 131–392261 / 166–402249 / 194–406273 / 158–410247 / 148–454188 / 127–397120 / 85–280127 / 68–223172 / 101–270227 / 123–386268 / 162–449
DLI32 / 27–3633 / 28–3735 / 31–3834 / 31–3732 / 30–3531 / 29–3432 / 29–3637 / 33–4039 / 37–4139 / 35–4134 / 31–3931 / 27–35
RH %69 / 65–7669 / 65–7669 / 64–7668 / 65–7568 / 65–7468 / 65–7366 / 64–7166 / 63–6865 / 63–6965 / 63–7067 / 65–7469 / 65–76

Each figure is the median across the 20 grid cells holding the 23 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 1852:6021 (-2.625, 121.075). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 19.9 °C, 1st-percentile night 22.4 °C, 99th-percentile day 35.2 °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 20 distinct grid cells holding the 23 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1852:6021 (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 -2.50_121.250, lapse-corrected -402 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 38 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.
NativeMaluku, Sulawesi· introduced: Chagos Archipelago, Comoros, China Southeast, Taiwan, Assam, Bangladesh, India, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Nicobar Is., Thailand, Vietnam, Malaya, New Guinea, Caroline Is., Marianas, El Salvador, Brazil Northeast
Kew's description“tree” · “wet tropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker1.572, 125.161 · in the densest population, 8 records (35% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 23 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 14 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 725 km away. 1125 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 23 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Averrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbiAverrhoa bilimbi

Photographs: (c) libby hepburn, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); no rights reserved · CC0 (2); (c) Gannu03, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA); (c) Navaneeth Sini George, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3).

Photographs: iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons 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 Averrhoa bilimbi, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Green nanotechnology: a review on green synthesis of silver nanoparticles — an ecofriendly approach
Shabir Ahmad, Sidra Munir, Nadia Zeb, Asad Ullah (2019) · International Journal of Nanomedicine
Vitamin C—Sources, Physiological Role, Kinetics, Deficiency, Use, Toxicity, and Determination
Martin Doseděl, Eduard Jirkovský, Kateřina Macáková, Lenka Kujovská Krčmová (2021) · Nutrients
The role of medicinal plants in the treatment of diabetes: a systematic review
Wesam Kooti, Maryam Farokhipour, Zahra Asadzadeh, Damoon Ashtary‐Larky (2016) · Electronic physician
Structure and Applications of Pectin in Food, Biomedical, and Pharmaceutical Industry: A Review
Cariny Polesca, J. S. R. Coimbra, Victor Gomes Lauriano Souza, Rita Cássia Superbi Sousa (2021) · Coatings
Effects of Averrhoa bilimbi leaf extract on blood glucose and lipids in streptozotocin-diabetic rats
Peter Natesan Pushparaj, C.H. Tan, B.K.H. Tan (2000) · Journal of Ethnopharmacology
Quercetin, a Flavonoid with Great Pharmacological Capacity
Eber Josue Carrillo-Martinez, F. Hernández, Adriana María Salazar-Montes, Hector Fabián Nario-Chaidez (2024) · Molecules
Antioxidant Activity of Polyphenolic Plant Extracts
Dimitrios Stagos (2019) · Antioxidants
Phyto-assisted synthesis, characterization and applications of gold nanoparticles – A review
J. Santhoshkumar, S. Rajeshkumar, S. Venkat Kumar (2017) · Biochemistry and Biophysics Reports
Therapeutic and pharmacological efficacy of selective Indian medicinal plants – A review
Murugan Prasathkumar, Salim Anisha, Dhrisya Chenthamara, Becky Robert (2021) · Phytomedicine Plus

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.

Other Averrhoa 1 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (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 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried 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 2026-09-20; 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 72 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.