Species
+

Commiphora caudata (Wight & Arn.) Engl.

hill-mango, kiluvai, pachaikiluvai

Climate known 64 photographs Cactus or succulent
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

Commiphora caudata, the hill mango or green commiphora, is the most abundant Asian species of the genus Commiphora of flowering plants in the family Burseraceae. It is native to Southern India and Sri Lanka, usually growing in the full sun on hilly granite rock outcrops in dry zone areas. It is a small to medium-sized deciduous tree which may reach a height of 10-20m, but usually less. The tree has a smooth, succulent green bark, which partly flakes off with age, giving rise to a characteristic patchwork of green and brown patches. More on Wikipedia ›

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

About the genus · Commiphora

Commiphora is the most species-rich genus of flowering plants in the frankincense and myrrh family, Burseraceae. The genus contains approximately 190 species of shrubs and trees, which are distributed throughout the (sub-) tropical regions of Africa, the western Indian Ocean islands, the Arabian Peninsula, India, and South America. The genus is drought-tolerant and common throughout the xerophytic scrub, seasonally dry tropical forests, and woodlands of these regions.

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

Family
Burseraceae
Described by
(Wight & Arn.) Engl.
Native to
India, Sri Lanka
Wild records
49 in range· 20 open

At a glance

Warmest month
34°C
Apr, mean day; nights 23 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1051mm/yr
9 wet months · peak Oct 201 mm (CHELSA)
Light
28–43DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Grouped as a cactus or succulent by the genus Commiphora, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: a rainy season, May and July to November in the northern hemisphere, at the year's mean temperature, so called neither winter nor summer. Habitat rain 1051 mm a year, wettest October at 201 mm, driest February at 11 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 28 to 43 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 14.7 °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 Amyris acuminata Roxb.; Amyris serratifolia Rottler; Amyris serratifolia Rottler ex A.W.Benn.; Balsamea caudata (Wight & Arn.) Engl.; Balsamea pubescens (Wight & Arn.) Engl. and 9 more.

Cultivation

Grouped as a cactus or succulent by the genus Commiphora, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). The table holds no figure for this group, which spans too much for one minimum; the cold floor is the habitat's alone, and no prose comes from the table.

Its year Rain rule: a rainy season, May and July to November in the northern hemisphere, at the year's mean temperature, so called neither winter nor summer.

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

The rain rule reads a rainy season with no name: 70% of the year's rain (803 mm of 1051 mm) falls in May and July to November, whose mean temperature, 26.1 °C, is within half a degree of the year's, 26.0 °C, so it is neither the cooler nor the warmer part of the year. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: January to May and November.

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 1051 mm a year, wettest October at 201 mm, driest February at 11 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1051 mm a year at the habitat, 803 mm of it May and July to November. Wettest month October at 201 mm, driest February at 11 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 835 mm to 1871 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: 28 to 43 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 28 to 43 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 25, the highest 90th-percentile month 44).

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 14.7 °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 14.7 °C, the absolute minimum 11.8 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 42.5 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 17.8 °C in January (across the envelope cells 14.6 °C to 21.6 °C), warmest day 33.8 °C in April (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 14.7 °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: 55 to 64% 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 Dec to 34 °C in Apr; mean night from 18 °C in Jan to 24 °C in May. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1051 mm of rain a year, most in Oct. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 42 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 11.8 °C and the 99th-percentile day 42.5 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.10°20°30°40°50°42.5° 99th-percentile day (undated)11.8° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 28–43RH 55–64 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 42 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 °C28 / 27–3031 / 29–3233 / 31–3534 / 31–3733 / 30–3731 / 26–3530 / 25–3430 / 25–3430 / 26–3329 / 26–3128 / 26–2927 / 25–29
Night °C18 / 15–2219 / 16–2221 / 18–2423 / 20–2624 / 20–2724 / 20–2723 / 19–2623 / 19–2623 / 19–2522 / 18–2420 / 17–2319 / 15–22
Rain mm16 / 3–3911 / 3–4022 / 14–7064 / 22–12391 / 55–17673 / 40–31395 / 49–434119 / 48–301133 / 84–203201 / 166–294164 / 53–29962 / 14–164
DLI34 / 32–3740 / 38–4143 / 41–4441 / 39–4440 / 36–4234 / 29–3632 / 25–3632 / 27–3735 / 31–3832 / 30–3328 / 27–3230 / 27–33
RH %59 / 53–6256 / 50–6055 / 49–6058 / 53–6360 / 53–6563 / 54–7163 / 55–7263 / 56–7163 / 58–6964 / 60–6864 / 61–6862 / 57–66

Each figure is the median across the 42 grid cells holding the 46 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 1554:5179 (12.275, 78.975). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 11.8 °C, 1st-percentile night 14.7 °C, 99th-percentile day 42.5 °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 42 distinct grid cells holding the 46 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1554:5179 (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 12.50_78.750, lapse-corrected -188 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 230 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.
NativeIndia, Sri Lanka
Kew's description“tree” · “desert or dry shrubland”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker12.076, 76.856 · in the densest population, 21 records (43% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 49 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 20 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 45 km away. 1 record outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 3 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 49 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Commiphora caudataCommiphora caudataCommiphora caudataCommiphora caudataCommiphora caudataCommiphora caudataCommiphora caudataCommiphora caudata

Photographs: (c) Siddarth Machado, some rights reserved (CC BY) (8).

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 Commiphora caudata, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Antioxidant studies on the ethanolic extract of Commiphora spp.
VS Deepa, P. Bharath Kumar, S. Latha, P. Selvamani (2009) · AFRICAN JOURNAL OF BIOTECHNOLOGY
Seed treatment with aqueous extract ofViscumalbuminduces resistance to pearl millet downy mildew pathogen
Chandrashekhara, S. Niranjan Raj, G. Manjunath, Saligrama Deepak (2010) · Journal of Plant Interactions
Corrosion inhibitory action ofCommiphora caudataextract on the mild steel corrosion in 1 M H2SO4acid medium
S. Aejitha, P. K. Kasthuri, S. Jyothi (2015) · Journal of Adhesion Science and Technology
Nutritional potentialities of some tree leaves based on polyphenols and rumen in vitro gas production
K.S. Giridhar, T.M. Prabhu, K. Chandrapal Singh, V. Nagabhushan (2018) · Veterinary World
Antioxidant and antibacterial activities of bark extracts from Commiphora berryi and Commiphora caudata
Ramesh Kumari, Meyyappan Arumugam, Debkumar Nandi, Bikram Keshari Agrawalla (2011) · Natural Product Research
Anti-arthritic activity of ethanolic extract from the leaves of Commiphora caudata (Linn.) in complete Freund′s adjuvant-induced arthritic rats
Venkateshwarlu Eggadi, Girija Pashikanti, Umasankar Kulundaivelu, VenkateshwarRao Jupalli (2014) · Nigerian Journal of Experimental and Clinical Biosciences
Anti-inflammatory, analgesic and anti-lipid peroxidation studies on leaves of Commiphora caudata (Wight & Arn.) Engl.
W. Annu, P. Latha, Jessy Shaji, G. I. Anuja (2010) · Indian Journal of Natural Products and Resources
Antiulcerogenic activity of Commiphora caudata bark extract against ethanol-induced gastric ulcer in rats
Kannan Chandrasekar, Varadha Rajan, David Raj Chellappan, Narayanasamy Lakshmanan Gowrishankar (2009) · Journal of Pharmacy Research
ANTI INFLAMMATORY ACTIVITY OF FOLKLORE MEDICINAL PLANT COMMIPHORA CAUDATA (WIGHT & ARN.)
S Balasundar, Ravi S Rao, P Subramanya (2016) · International Journal of Research in Ayurveda and Pharmacy

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 Commiphora 170 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 6 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.