Chá de BugreCordia ecalyculata

Did you know?

• Chá de bugre is not an Amazon plant. It grows in the forests of southern and eastern Brazil and in neighboring Paraguay and Argentina^{[1, 2]}.

• The name Cordia salicifolia, "willow-leaved cordia", was coined in 1829 by Adelbert von Chamisso, the German-language poet best known for Peter Schlemihl, the tale of a man who sells his shadow^{[5, 6]}.

• Another old botanical name for the tree, Cordia coffeoides, means "coffee-like cordia", and in Brazil it is also called café-de-bugre and café-do-mato, "coffee of the woods"^{[1, 3, 8]}.

• It belongs to the borage family, also known as the forget-me-not family^{[1, 9]}.

• Its genus, Cordia, is large: more than 200 species, some of them important timber trees^[9].

• In Argentina the tree is known as colita^{[3, 8]}.

Origins and history

Chá de bugre is a tree of the Atlantic side of South America. In Brazil it is recorded from Bahia and Minas Gerais south through Espírito Santo, Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Paraná and Santa Catarina to Rio Grande do Sul, and it crosses the border into Paraguay and northeastern Argentina^{[1, 2]}. It grows in both humid and seasonally dry forests, far from the Amazon basin^{[1, 2]}. It becomes a tree of about 8 to 16 meters with a leafy crown, and its small, fleshy fruits are sought out by many kinds of wildlife^[10].

The tree has two botanical names, both from the same year. It was first described as Cordia ecalyculata in 1829, in Flora Fluminensis^{[1, 5]}. That same year, Adelbert von Chamisso published it again, as Cordia salicifolia, in the Berlin botanical journal Linnaea^[5]. Chamisso (1781 to 1838) was a botanist as well as a poet^{[5, 6]}. Botanists later concluded that the two names describe one tree, and Kew's Plants of the World Online, GBIF and Brazil's national flora now all use Cordia ecalyculata^{[1, 2, 8]}. Cordia salicifolia lives on in the herb trade^[3].

The tree's popular names are Portuguese. Chá means tea. Bugre is an old Portuguese word, borrowed from the French bougre, that was used for the Indigenous peoples of Brazil and is now considered derogatory^{[11, 12]}. The tree is also known as porangaba^{[3, 4]}, and in the US herb trade's standard naming guide, Herbs of Commerce, it is listed as chá-de-bugre^[3].

Traditional uses

Clinical studies in people are still few, but chá de bugre has a strong popular following in Brazil, where it is one of the plants people turn to as a tea when managing their weight^{[4, 7]}.

• A leaf tea

  True to its name, chá de bugre is traditionally prepared as a tea: the leaves, or thin leafy twigs, are steeped in hot water.^[4]

• Healthy weight management

  In Brazil the leaf tea is popularly taken by people watching their weight, and commercial demand for the leaf keeps growing. Chá de bugre supports healthy weight management as part of a balanced diet and exercise.*^{[4, 7]}

• Beyond Brazil

  In Argentina, where it is called colita, it is recorded among the native plants of the country's traditional herbal practice.^{[3, 8]}

Plant compounds

Chá de bugre leaf contains naturally occurring plant compounds, notably allantoin^{[4, 7]}. Brazilian chemists isolated allantoin from the dried leaves in 1985, together with potassium chloride and tritriacontane, a long-chain hydrocarbon^[4].