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Freshcut

Dianthera pectoralis

Freshcut
Photo: scott.zona from Miami, Florida, USA, CC BY 2.0

Dianthera pectoralis, known as freshcut or water-willow, is a herbaceous subshrub or aquatic-margin plant from Mexico to tropical South America, often grown in damp or wet soil. It thrives in warm, moist conditions with consistent water.

Family
Acanthaceae (Acanthus family)
Grows as
Shrub, Aquatic
Light
Part shade, Bright indirect
Water
Keep soil consistently moist or shallowly submerged; do not let it dry out.
Soil
Rich, moist garden loam or a peaty potting mix.
Temperature
18–30 °C; protect below 10 °C
How easy
Easy
Native range
Mexico to S. Trop. America
Climate
seasonally dry tropical

About

Dianthera pectoralis is an herb in the family Acanthaceae. This water-willow is widely known as tilo in Latin America and in Cuba. In Haiti, it is called chapantye and zeb chapantyè on Dominica and Martinique. Other folk names are freshcut, chambá carpintero ("carpenter"), té criollo ("Criollo tea"), curia, death-angel, masha-hari, or "piri piri". This species was described by Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin in 1760, who provided additional data in 1763. A well-marked variety, var. stenophylla, was described by Emery Clarence Leonard in 1958.

Other Dianthera plants

Dianthera americana

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Dianthera pectoralis 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.

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