Alstonia scholaris
Also known as: Dita (Philippine name) · Blackboard tree, devil tree (English common names) · Chhatim (India) · White cheesewood (timber trade)
Definition
Alstonia scholaris, known in the Philippines as dita and elsewhere as blackboard tree, devil tree, or white cheesewood, is a tall evergreen tree of the dogbane family (Apocynaceae) native to South and Southeast Asia, including Philippine lowland and foothill forests. It bears glossy whorled leaves and clusters of small fragrant white flowers, exudes a milky latex when cut, and yields both lightweight timber and the traditional medicinal bark called dita bark. The species epithet refers to its historical use for making writing slates and blackboards.
Identities
| Database | Identifier |
|---|---|
| Wikipedia | Alstonia scholaris |
| Wikidata | Q135307 |
| DBpedia | Alstonia_scholaris |
Also Known As
- Dita (Philippine name)
- Blackboard tree, devil tree (English common names)
- Chhatim (India)
- White cheesewood (timber trade)
Examples and Analogies
Dita plays in Philippine folk medicine a role analogous to cinchona bark elsewhere: a bitter bark brewed as a tonic against fevers. As an ornamental, it behaves like a tropical version of the lilac, one obvious difference being its evening perfume, which some find heavy, and its habit of dropping old leaves in a brief dry spell before flushing new growth.
Usage Scenarios
The wood is pulped for writing and printing paper and used for packing cases, matches, pencils, and floats. Plantings line avenues, campuses, and plazas for shade. In traditional medicine, dita bark preparations serve as bitter tonics and treatments for fevers and dysentery, and pharmacological study has examined its alkaloids. Beekeepers value its nectar flowers.
Strategies
Silvicultural strategies exploit the species’ fast growth: dita is planted in reforestation and paper-farm schemes and managed on short rotations for pulp. Medicinal-plant programs cultivate it to take pressure off wild stands, and urban foresters select it for polluted roadsides where hardy natives are needed. Research strategies screen its bark chemistry for antimicrobial and antimalarial compounds.
Security and Safety Measures
All parts exude latex that can irritate skin and eyes, so harvesters and pruners wear protection. Medicinal use requires caution, since traditional doses of bitter barks are not standardized and self-treatment for serious fevers risks delaying care for malaria and other diseases. Plantation workers face usual chainsaw and felling hazards with the added slipperiness of latex-wet bark.
Historical Context
Dita entered the colonial materia medica early, with Spanish-era and later American-period pharmacopoeias listing dita bark among Philippine drug plants, and the Bureau of Science studying its alkaloids in the early twentieth century. The tree’s straight, light trunks fed the match and pencil trades, and it became a familiar ornamental across Asian cities. Modern phytochemistry has continued to investigate its indole alkaloids.
Challenges and Controversies
In some Pacific and Asian cities it is considered invasive beyond its native range, prompting debates about planting it outside its natural range. Within the Philippines, unregulated bark stripping damages wild trees, and efficacy claims of folk preparations outpace clinical evidence. Urban managers weigh its fragrant flowering against complaints about strong night scent and brittle branches in storms.
Related Topic
Philippine Forestry