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Palicourea tomentosa
Also called Sexy Lips, Hot Lips, Sore Mouth Bush
Palicourea tomentosa, known as Girlfriends Lips, is a large tropical shrub in the coffee family, grown for its striking red bracts that surround small yellow flowers. The sources describe the wild species; the key to growing it is warm, humid, frost-free conditions with bright light.
Palicourea tomentosa, many synonyms, including Psychotria poeppigiana, is a plant species in the family Rubiaceae. A common name is sore-mouth bush, though it is not very often used.
It ranges widely in the tropical Americas, from Chiapas, Oaxaca, Tabasco and Veracruz in Mexico to the very north of Argentina. It does not occur on the Pacific side of the American Cordillera however, and is thus absent from El Salvador and Chile. It is probably also absent from Uruguay and Paraguay.
The Ka'apor people of Maranhão (Brazil) use its flowers as a "hunting fetish", a magical talisman to facilitate hunting. As the Tulane University anthropologist and historical ecologist William Balée describes it,
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Palicourea tomentosa 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.
