Alstonia scholaris
species of flowering plant
Alstonia scholaris, commonly called blackboard tree, scholar tree, milkwood or devil's tree in English, is an evergreen tree in the oleander and frangipani family Apocynaceae. Its natural range is from Pakistan to China, and south to northern Australia. It is a toxic plant, but is used traditionally for myriad diseases and complaints. It is called 'Saptaparna' in India and is the sacred tree of the 2nd Jain tirthankar Ajitnatha. It was first described by Linnaeus in 1767, who gave it the name Echites scholaris.
Description
Alstonia scholaris is a large tree growing up to 40 m (130 ft) tall (rarely to 60 m), with narrow buttressess that extend well up the trunk, giving it a fluted appearance. The bark is gray to pale gray with numerous lenticels, and all parts of the plant exude copious amounts of white sap when broken or cut.
The leaves are glossy dark green above and pale below, and they are arranged in whorls of four to eight, with petioles (leaf stalks) around 5–15 mm (0.20–0.59 in) long. The leaves are usually obovate (i.e. broadest near the apex) to elliptic, tapering towards the base and with a rounded tip, and there are 25 to 40 pairs of lateral veins at 80–90° to the midvein.
The public source identifies “Alstonia scholaris” as species of flowering plant. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Alstonia, scholaris and species.
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The date and method of observation matter as much as the stated conclusion, especially where classification or consensus has changed. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q135307. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1767.
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This entry incorporates text from “Alstonia scholaris” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.