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Alternanthera helleri is a species of plant in the amaranth family, endemic to the Galápagos Islands of Ecuador and now very rare in the wild. It is grown mainly in laboratory settings.
Alternanthera helleri is a species of plant in the family Amaranthaceae. It is endemic to the Galápagos Islands of Ecuador. It is believed to be green in color anywhere from 90 to 100% of the year depending on elevation. The leaves are considered to be highly toxic to humans and should not be consumed under any circumstances.
Alternanthera helleri is a fall-blooming species, it can be planted at any time of year, but the best time is early/middle fall, as this provides it with an optimum blooming window when it will be in season. It is very rare to find growing in the wild, and recent national park's and forest's efforts to remove hazardous plants such as this one have drastically reduced the numbers in the wild. It is still grown, however, in laboratory settings, where scientists try to analyze just exactly what makes it so toxic to humans.
Calico Plant · Alternanthera brasiliana var. villosa · Brazilian joyweed · Sanguinaria · Alligatorweed · Scarlet Temple · Sessile joyweed
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Alternanthera helleri by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
