The open plant encyclopedia
Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.
The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.
Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.
Rauvolfia tetraphylla
Also called Milkbush, Devil Pepper, Four Leaf Devil Pepper, Devil's Pepper, Four Leaf Devil's Pepper
In Singapore: Be Still Tree, Devil Pepper, Wild Snake Root, 四叶萝芙木 (Grown in Singapore)
Rauvolfia tetraphylla is a shrub or small tree in the dogbane family, native to the Americas and now naturalized across the tropics, grown as an ornamental and in traditional medicine. It thrives in warm, humid conditions with bright light.
Rauvolfia tetraphylla is a plant in the family Apocynaceae, growing as a bush or small tree. It is commonly known as the be still tree or devil-pepper. The plant is native to Mexico, Central America, West Indies, and northern South America. It has been cultivated widely as both an ornamental and for use in traditional medicine. It is now naturalized throughout the tropics including Australasia, Indochina, and India.
Rauvolfia tetraphylla fruits are called devil-peppers and hold an important position in the Indian traditional system of medicine. The plant has various significance and it is widely used by South Indian tribes.
Rauvolfia mannii · Rauvolfia media · Serpentine wood · Rauvolfia verticillata · Devil's-pepper
[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 Rauvolfia tetraphylla 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.
