Species
+

Ficus altissima Blume

Council tree, Council tree, False Banyan, Mountain Fig

Climate known 35 photographs Tropical foliage plant
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

Ficus altissima, commonly known as the council tree and lofty fig, is a species of flowering plant, a fig tree in the family Moraceae. It is a large, stately evergreen hemiepiphyte and is native to southeastern Asia.

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

About the genus · Ficus

Ficus is a genus of about 850 species of woody trees, shrubs, vines, epiphytes and hemiepiphytes in the family Moraceae. Collectively known as fig trees or figs, they are native throughout the tropics with a few species extending into the semi-warm temperate zone. Many Ficus species are grown for their fruits, though only two species, the common fig and sycamore fig, are cultivated to any extent, with common fig being the type species and by far the most important. More on Wikipedia ›

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

Family
Moraceae
Described by
Blume
Native to
China South-Central, Hainan, China Southeast +18
Wild records
273 in range· 143 open

At a glance

Warmest month
29°C
Aug, mean day; nights 24 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1528mm/yr
10 wet months · peak Aug 258 mm (CHELSA)
Light
23–37DLI
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 tropical foliage plant by the genus Ficus, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). Rain rule: a summer growing season, May to September in the northern hemisphere (May to September at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 1528 mm a year, wettest August at 258 mm, driest January at 20 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 23 to 37 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 12 °C (archetype minimum for a tropical foliage plant, above the 7.8 °C habitat night).
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 Ficus altissima f. laccifera (Roxb.) King; Ficus altissima var. laccifera (Roxb.) Prain; Ficus cartagenensis Dugand; Ficus laccifera Wight; Ficus laccifera Wight ex Roxb. and 3 more.

Cultivation

Grouped as a tropical foliage plant by the genus Ficus, which is reliably one kind of plant (archetype table). The table supplies one figure for this group, a conventional minimum for the cold floor, and no prose.

Its year Rain rule: a summer growing season, May to September in the northern hemisphere (May to September at the habitat, northern).

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

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the year's rain (1125 mm of 1528 mm) falls in May to September, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 26.6 °C against a yearly mean of 22.9 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: November to March.

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 1528 mm a year, wettest August at 258 mm, driest January at 20 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1528 mm a year at the habitat, 1125 mm of it May to September. Wettest month August at 258 mm, driest January at 20 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1028 mm to 2792 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: 23 to 37 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 23 to 37 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 16, 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 12 °C (archetype minimum for a tropical foliage plant, above the 7.8 °C habitat night).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is 7.8 °C, the absolute minimum 3.0 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 32.1 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 12.3 °C in January (across the envelope cells 5.5 °C to 23.2 °C), warmest day 28.9 °C in August (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 12 °C. The habitat figure, the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER), is 7.8 °C; the archetype table's conventional minimum for a tropical foliage plant (grouped by the genus Ficus, which is reliably one kind of plant) is 12 °C, which is higher, and the floor rule takes the higher.

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, and the archetype table's group minimum where that is higher. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 60 to 67% 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 21 °C in Dec to 29 °C in Aug; mean night from 12 °C in Jan to 24 °C in Jul. The cold quarter, Dec to Feb, is the three months around the coldest night. 1528 mm of rain a year, most in Aug. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 205 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 3.0 °C and the 99th-percentile day 32.1 °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°32.1° 99th-percentile day (undated)3.0° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 23–37RH 60–67 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 205 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 °C22 / 15–2923 / 17–3026 / 20–3128 / 24–3329 / 25–3129 / 24–3129 / 24–3229 / 24–3128 / 23–3027 / 21–3024 / 18–2921 / 16–29
Night °C12 / 6–2314 / 7–2317 / 10–2520 / 13–2522 / 16–2624 / 17–2624 / 17–2624 / 17–2623 / 16–2520 / 13–2417 / 9–2413 / 6–23
Rain mm20 / 7–9129 / 10–13151 / 18–15098 / 39–213192 / 103–324216 / 114–414257 / 133–408258 / 122–406202 / 94–362124 / 64–31959 / 34–21322 / 10–209
DLI26 / 16–3431 / 18–3735 / 22–4137 / 26–4133 / 29–3731 / 25–3632 / 24–3631 / 25–3529 / 26–3328 / 23–3125 / 20–3123 / 18–32
RH %60 / 54–6861 / 51–6862 / 49–6863 / 52–6965 / 58–6967 / 63–7167 / 63–7367 / 63–7266 / 62–7164 / 60–6962 / 58–6760 / 56–67

Each figure is the median across the 205 grid cells holding the 265 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 1367:5761 (21.625, 108.075). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 3.0 °C, 1st-percentile night 7.8 °C, 99th-percentile day 32.1 °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 205 distinct grid cells holding the 265 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1367:5761 (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 21.50_108.125, lapse-corrected -24 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.
NativeChina South-Central, Hainan, China Southeast, Assam, Bangladesh, East Himalaya, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Andaman Is., Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Nicobar Is., Thailand, Vietnam, Jawa, Malaya, Philippines, Sulawesi, Sumatera
Kew's description“tree” · “wet tropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker18.626, 109.7 · in the densest population, 111 records (41% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 273 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 143 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 497 km away. 136 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 8 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 inside the densest 4° block of the 273 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Ficus altissimaFicus altissimaFicus altissimaFicus altissimaFicus altissimaFicus altissimaFicus altissimaFicus altissima

Photographs: (c) Aadi Kulkarni, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Luis Ángel Niño Barreat, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Mike Ostrowski, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (2); (c) Jaro Guzinski, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Claire Herzog, some rights reserved (CC BY).

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

Urban road greenbelt configuration: The perspective of PM2.5 removal and air quality regulation
Jiansheng Wu, Keyu Luo, Wang Yi, Zhenyu Wang (2021) · Environment International
Co-occurrence of two Eupristina species on Ficus altissima in Xishuangbanna, SW China
Yan‐Qiong Peng, Zhu-Biao Duan, Da‐Rong Yang, Jean–Yves Rasplus (2008) · DalSpace (Dalhousie University)
Fungal diversity on fallen leaves of Ficus in northern Thailand
Hongkai Wang, Kevin D. Hyde, Kasem Soytong, Fu‐Cheng Lin (2008) · Journal of Zhejiang University SCIENCE B
Condensed tannins from Ficus altissima leaves: Structural, antioxidant, and antityrosinase properties
Yi-Tao Deng, Liang Ge, Yan Shi, Hualiang Li (2016) · Process Biochemistry
Morphological structure of leaves and dust-retaining capability of common street trees in Guangzhou Municipality
刘璐 Liu Lu, 管东生 GUAN Dongsheng, 陈永勤 CHEN Yongqin (2013) · Acta Ecologica Sinica
Latitudinal effects on phenology near the northern limit of figs in China
Huanhuan Chen, Yuan Zhang, Yan‐Qiong Peng, Richard T. Corlett (2018) · Scientific Reports
Fe-nanocluster embedded biomass-derived carbon for efficient photo-Fenton-like activity in water purification
Xin Li, Wanrong Bu, Ke Zhu, Yuwen Chen (2024) · Separation and Purification Technology
Diversity of wild edible fruit plant species and their threatened status in the Aceh Province, Indonesia
Adi Bejo Suwardi, Zidni Ilman Navia, Tisna Harmawan, SEPRIANTO SEPRIANTO (2022) · Biodiversitas Journal of Biological Diversity

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 Ficus 18 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19 (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 answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-19; this build: api.gbif.org not asked: offline re-derivation
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 44 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.