Pygeum Africanum (Prunus africana): A Botanical Guide

01 What Pygeum Africanum is

Pygeum Africanum is the bark of a tree. Botanists know that tree as Prunus africana (Hook f.) Kalkman, in the family Rosaceae — the rose family, which also holds plums, cherries, apricots, almonds, apples and pears. It is a genuine Prunus, a close relative of the plum in your fruit bowl.

The name "Pygeum" is a leftover. The tree was once classified as Pygeum africanum; that name is now a synonym, Prunus africana is the accepted binomial, and the trade kept the old word anyway. You will see both on labels, including ours. Same tree.

The tree itself

A large evergreen canopy tree, 30 to 40 m in mature forest. The bark is black to dark brown and deeply fissured. Leaves are alternate and simple, roughly 8 to 20 cm long; the flowers are small, greenish-white, carried in racemes from the leaf axils. The fruit is a red-brown drupe — a small stone fruit, as you would expect from a Prunus — ripening between September and November. Common names include African cherry, African plum and red stinkwood.

It grows in the montane forests of central, eastern and southern Africa, and on the islands of Bioko, São Tomé, Grande Comore and Madagascar. A highland species, found roughly between 900 and 3,400 m in moist climates. It is also light-demanding, so it belongs to secondary forest, clearings and forest edges rather than deep shade.

The part used, and where it comes from

The bark is stripped from the trunk of mature trees and dried before extraction. This is where Pygeum parts company with most botanicals we sell: taking the bark can kill the tree, and a tree needs roughly 15 years of growth before its bark is worth harvesting at all.

Almost all bark entering international trade comes from wild trees. Cultivation exists — small-scale, in Cameroon, Kenya and Madagascar — but it supplies a fraction of demand. Thousands of tonnes of wild-harvested bark have been exported annually to Europe over recent decades, which puts Prunus africana among the most heavily wild-harvested plant species in the world by volume.

CITES Appendix II — why this matters

Prunus africana has been listed on Appendix II of CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, since February 1995. Appendix II covers species not necessarily threatened with extinction now, but that may become so unless trade is controlled.

In practice: international shipments of the bark and its derivatives, wild-collected and cultivated alike, require CITES export permits, and the exporting country must first make a "non-detriment finding" — a documented judgement that the export will not harm the survival of the species in the wild.

Enforcement has been an ongoing story rather than a solved problem. A Center for International Forestry Research review of three decades of trade data concluded that harvesting had been unsustainable over the long run.

Bark stripping frequently removes up to 100 per cent of the trunk bark, and tree mortality has exceeded 40 per cent in heavily worked areas of Cameroon and Kenya.

The European Commission suspended imports of Cameroonian Prunus africana in October 2007 over exactly these concerns, and lifted the suspension in 2011 after Cameroon produced a national management plan and field-based non-detriment findings. Cameroon's share of the global bark trade rose sharply afterwards.

None of that is a selling point, and we are not presenting it as one. It is the honest background to a botanical whose supply chain sits under international regulation. If you buy Pygeum from anyone, the reasonable question to ask is where the bark came from and under what permit.

Accepted binomial

Prunus africana (Hook f.) Kalkman

Former name still used in trade

Pygeum africanum

Family

Rosaceae (the rose family — plums, cherries, almonds, apples)

Other common names

African cherry, African plum, red stinkwood

Part used

Bark

Form

Evergreen canopy tree, 30–40 m

Where it grows

Montane Africa, roughly 900–3,400 m, plus Bioko, São Tomé, Grande Comore and Madagascar

Wild or cultivated

Overwhelmingly wild-harvested; small-scale cultivation in Cameroon, Kenya and Madagascar

Years to harvestable maturity

Around 15

Trade status

CITES Appendix II since February 1995 — export permits and non-detriment findings required

02 What's in our product

Two figures do the work on our label: a 100:1 extract ratio, and 22 per cent phytosterols. Both are arithmetic, and both are frequently misread.

What "100:1" actually means

An extract ratio describes how much dried raw plant material went into a given weight of finished extract. A 100:1 ratio means one hundred parts of dried bark were processed down to one part of extract powder. So 100 kg of dried bark yields 1 kg of 100:1 extract.

Applied to our label: each capsule holds 900 mg of 100:1 Pygeum africanum extract. Multiply by a hundred and you get 90,000 mg — 90 g of dried bark stated as the starting material behind a single capsule. At the labelled two-capsule serving, 1,800 mg of extract, equivalent to 180 g of dried bark.

180 g of dried bark stated behind one day's two capsules.

Two things about ratios. An extract ratio is a manufacturing description of concentration — not a measure of strength in any medicinal sense, and not a claim. And ratios are not directly comparable between different botanicals, different extraction solvents or different suppliers, so a bigger number on one label does not automatically mean more of anything than a smaller number on another.

What "22% phytosterols" means

Phytosterols are naturally occurring plant sterols, and they are the marker constituent quoted on our label. Quoting a marker percentage is how botanical extracts get described and tested against a stated composition, so that one batch is comparable with the next rather than variable. A specification figure. Not a statement about what the constituent does.

The arithmetic: 22 per cent of 900 mg is 198 mg of phytosterols per capsule, and 396 mg at the two-capsule daily serving.

Botanical

Pygeum Africanum (Prunus africana), bark

Extract ratio

100:1 concentrated extract

Per capsule

900 mg Pygeum africanum 100:1 extract, equivalent to 90 g of dried bark

Per serving (two capsules)

1,800 mg of 100:1 extract, equivalent to 180 g of dried bark

Phytosterol content

22% phytosterols — 198 mg per capsule, 396 mg per two-capsule serving

Ingredients

Two only: Pygeum africanum extract, and hypromellose (the capsule shell)

Capsule shell

Hypromellose, a plant-derived cellulose material. No gelatin, no animal-derived ingredients

Suitable for vegans

Yes

Allergens

Free from gluten, soy and dairy, and from common allergens

Additives

No artificial additives and no fillers. Non-GMO

Bottle count

60 capsules

How long a bottle lasts

30 days at two capsules daily — a one-month supply

Manufacture and dispatch

Made in a GMP-certified facility with batch testing; every order dispatched from the UK

Format

Capsules. This product is not available as drops or a tincture

Two ingredients means no bulking agents, no flow agents, no silica, no magnesium stearate, no rice flour. The shell is hypromellose. Inside it is Pygeum africanum extract. That is the whole list.

03 How to take it

The label directions run: Take two capsules daily, preferably with a meal and water. Do not exceed the recommended amount.

• Timing. The label does not specify a time of day. Fixing it to the same meal each day is the simplest way to keep a daily habit going and to avoid double-dosing by accident.
• With or without food. The directions say preferably with a meal. Concentrated bark extracts are generally more comfortable taken with food than on an empty stomach.
• Together or split. Two capsules is the daily serving. Whether you take both at one meal or one at each of two meals, the daily total stays at two.
• Swallow whole. Take with a full glass of water. Do not chew.
• Missed a day. Carry on as normal the next day. Do not take extra to make up for it.
• Do not exceed. More is not a better plan. Stay at the labelled serving.
• Food supplement. This is not a substitute for a varied and balanced diet or a healthy lifestyle.

Storage. Keep the bottle tightly closed in a cool, dry place, out of direct sunlight. Not above a hob, not on a windowsill, not in a steamy bathroom cabinet — heat and humidity are what degrade dried plant extracts. Keep out of the sight and reach of children. Check the best-before date on the bottle.

04 Taste and format

Capsules only, so for most people taste is a non-issue. The hypromellose shell is tasteless and odourless, and it does not begin to dissolve until it is well past the palate. No flavouring, no sweetener, because there is nothing to flavour around.

Open the bottle and you may notice a smell. Concentrated bark extract is a dark brown powder with a dry, woody, faintly bitter aroma — closer to sawdust or strong tea leaves than to anything fruity, despite the tree being a plum relative. Normal for a bark extract, and not a sign that anything is wrong with the product.

We would not suggest opening the capsules. The powder is markedly bitter and clings to everything, and there is little point emptying it into food or a drink when the capsule does the job. Shade and aroma vary a little between batches; that reflects harvest conditions and the specific bark lot, not quality.

The capsules are a standard size and described on the label as easy to swallow, and the bottle holds 60. Pygeum is sold elsewhere as a tincture, as drops and as loose powder. We do not currently offer those formats, so the guidance on this page applies to capsules.

05 Where to find it

UK Standard delivery

£3.95 — free on orders of £30 or more

UK Express delivery

£4.95 — free on orders of £48 or more

Dispatch

Within 1–2 business days

Typical delivery time

1–4 business days, by Royal Mail or Amazon Logistics

Returns

30 days from receipt to request a return. Item must be unopened, untampered, in its original packaging, with proof of purchase. Email hello@probotanics.co.uk to start — an accepted return receives a return shipping label and instructions. Items sent back without requesting a return first are not accepted. For damaged, defective or incorrect items, contact us immediately on receipt.

Questions

hello@probotanics.co.uk

ProBotanics Ltd is a UK company, number 13685177, with its registered office at 86-90 Paul Street, London, EC2A 4NE. The company was incorporated on 18 October 2021 as Peak Supplements Ltd and renamed ProBotanics Ltd on 28 November 2023, when the brand moved away from its original sports and bodybuilding range to single-botanical food supplements.