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Elephant's foot

Elephantopus scaber

Also called Elephants Foot, Prickly Leaved Elephant's Foot

In Singapore: Tutup Bumi, Elephant's Foot, Bull's tongue, Ironweed, 地胆草, 苦地胆, 鹿耳草(海南) (Naturalised in Singapore)

Elephant's foot
Photo: J.M.Garg, CC BY-SA 4.0

Elephant's foot (Elephantopus scaber) is a small perennial herb in the daisy family, native to tropical and subtropical Asia, Africa and northern Australia, grown mainly as a medicinal and garden plant. It thrives in moist, partly shaded conditions similar to its forest-edge habitat.

Family
Asteraceae (Daisy family)
Grows as
Perennial
Light
Part shade, Bright indirect
Water
Keep soil evenly moist and never waterlogged.
Soil
Fertile, well-drained loam rich in organic matter.
Temperature
18–30 °C; protect below 10 °C
How easy
Easy
Native range
Trop. & Subtrop. Old World
Climate
subtropical

About

Elephantopus scaber is a tropical species of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae. It is native to tropical Africa, Eastern Asia, Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and northern Australia. It has become naturalized in tropical Africa and Latin America. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist montane forests.

Uses

Elephantopus scaber is used as a traditional medicine. Different parts of the plant are used in traditional medicine of India as an astringent agent, cardiac tonic, and diuretic, and is used for eczema, rheumatism, fever, and bladder stones. E. scaber modulates inflammatory responses by inhibiting the production of TNFα and IL-1β.

Other Elephantopus plants

Carolina elephantsfoot

[Contains information from Leaf Area Index (LAI) and Heritage Trees from data.gov.sg (National Parks Board), made available under the terms of the Singapore Open Data Licence version 1.0]

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Elephantopus scaber 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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