Species
+

Plectranthus ciliatus E.Mey.

Eyelash Spurflower, Speckled spur-flower, speckled spur flower

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

Plectranthus ciliatus, called Indian borage, speckled spur flower, blue spur flower, and candlestick plant, is a species of flowering plant in the family Lamiaceae. It is native to South Africa and Eswatini, and introduced to Victoria in Australia and the North and South Islands of New Zealand. With its Coleus‑like foliage, its cultivar 'Easy Gold' has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit as an ornamental.

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

About the genus · Plectranthus

Plectranthus is a genus of about 85 species of flowering plants from the mint/sage family, Lamiaceae, found mostly in southern and tropical Africa and Madagascar. Common names include spur-flower. Plectranthus species are herbaceous perennial plants, rarely annuals or soft-wooded shrubs, sometimes succulent; sometimes with a tuberous base.

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

Family
Lamiaceae
Described by
E.Mey.
Native to
Cape Provinces, KwaZulu-Natal, Swaziland +1
Wild records
301 in range· 104 open

At a glance

Warmest month
25°C
Feb, mean day; nights 18 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
946mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Jan 126 mm (CHELSA)
Light
20–38DLI
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 summer growing season, April to September in the northern hemisphere (October to March at the habitat, southern). Habitat rain 946 mm a year, wettest January at 126 mm, driest June at 32 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 20 to 38 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 5.0 °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 Plectranthus ciliatus E.Mey. ex Benth.; Plectranthus natalensis Gürke.

Cultivation

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

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 (668 mm of 946 mm) falls in October to March, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 19.8 °C against a yearly mean of 17.6 °C). Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere; shifted six months for a northern-hemisphere collection: April to September.

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 946 mm a year, wettest January at 126 mm, driest June at 32 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

946 mm a year at the habitat, 668 mm of it October to March. Wettest month January at 126 mm, driest June at 32 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 693 mm to 1185 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: 20 to 38 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 20 to 38 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 50).

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 5.0 °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 5.0 °C, the absolute minimum 1.7 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 33.2 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 9.4 °C in July (across the envelope cells 3.8 °C to 14.3 °C), warmest day 25.2 °C in February (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 5.0 °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 65% 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 20 °C in Jun to 25 °C in Feb; mean night from 9 °C in Jul to 18 °C in Feb. The cold quarter, Jun to Aug, is the three months around the coldest night. 946 mm of rain a year, most in Jan. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 169 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 1.7 °C and the 99th-percentile day 33.2 °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°33.2° 99th-percentile day (undated)1.7° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200mm rainDLI 20–38RH 54–65 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 169 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 °C25 / 23–2725 / 23–2724 / 22–2623 / 20–2522 / 18–2320 / 16–2220 / 16–2121 / 16–2221 / 17–2322 / 19–2323 / 20–2424 / 21–26
Night °C17 / 14–2118 / 14–2217 / 13–2115 / 11–1912 / 7–1710 / 4–159 / 4–1410 / 6–1512 / 8–1613 / 10–1715 / 11–1916 / 13–20
Rain mm126 / 44–167114 / 42–14994 / 57–13363 / 46–8738 / 21–8032 / 17–10134 / 16–11244 / 27–9767 / 41–9597 / 66–125116 / 60–151121 / 49–149
DLI38 / 34–5036 / 33–4431 / 30–3626 / 25–2822 / 19–2420 / 16–2121 / 18–2325 / 23–2730 / 29–3233 / 31–3936 / 33–4738 / 35–50
RH %65 / 62–6865 / 62–6865 / 62–6763 / 59–6458 / 54–6155 / 51–5954 / 51–5957 / 53–6161 / 57–6263 / 60–6563 / 61–6664 / 61–67

Each figure is the median across the 169 grid cells holding the 299 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 2396:4215 (-29.825, 30.775). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 1.7 °C, 1st-percentile night 5.0 °C, 99th-percentile day 33.2 °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 169 distinct grid cells holding the 299 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 2396:4215 (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 -30.00_30.625, lapse-corrected +28 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 475 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.
NativeCape Provinces, KwaZulu-Natal, Swaziland, Northern Provinces· introduced: Victoria, New Zealand North, New Zealand South
Kew's description“subshrub” · “subtropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker-29.73, 30.532 · in the densest population, 136 records (45% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 301 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 104 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 10 km away. 437 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 2 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 301 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Plectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatusPlectranthus ciliatus

Photographs: (c) Kate McAlpine, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Nanna Joubert, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA) (5); no rights reserved · CC0; (c) Rosemary Harrison, 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 Plectranthus ciliatus, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Ecological impacts of ground cover weeds in New Zealand lowland forests.
Kate McAlpine, Shona L. Lamoureaux, Ian Westbrooke (2015)
High concentrations of aromatic acylated anthocyanins found in cauline hairs in Plectranthus ciliatus
Monica Jordheim, Kate Emma Calcott, Kevin S. Gould, Kevin M. Davies (2016) · Phytochemistry
Ethnobotanical survey of medicinal plants used by Bapedi traditional healers to manage HIV/AIDS in the Limpopo Province, South Africa
Sebua Silas Semenya, M.J. Potgieter, Lourens Johannes Christoffel Erasmus (2013) · Journal of Medicinal Plants Research
Microdistillation and essential oil chemistry—a useful tool for detecting hybridisation in Plectranthus (Lamiaceae)
Alvaro Viljoen, Betül Demırcı, K. Hüsnü Can Başer, C.J. Potgieter (2006) · South African Journal of Botany
Can a reduced rate of herbicide benefit native plants and control ground cover weeds?
Kate McAlpine, Shona L. Lamoureaux, S. M. Timmins, Debra M. Wotton (2018) · New Zealand Journal of Ecology
Herbicide responses of matforming weeds of forest remnants in New Zealand
T.K. James, C.A. Dowsett (2015) · Proceedings of the New Zealand Weed Control Conference
Antibacterial constituents from Plectranthus ciliatus
Michael Stavri, Simon Gibbons (2007) · Planta Medica
Comparing biochemical and biophysical methodologies for the characterization of induced cell death
Karlien Le Roux (2015) · UpSpace Institutional Repository (University of Pretoria)
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility
Occurrence Download
GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility

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 Plectranthus 2 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 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 21 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.