Melicoccus pedicellaris
Content
Description
Tree 12-14 m tall, with stout lateral branches on upper one-third of trunk; trunk reaching 25 cm in diam.; buttressed at base; bark brown or reddish brown, rough, thin, peeling off in irregular plates; inner bark reddish brown. Branches terete, puberulent, becoming lenticellate. Leaves paripinnate; petioles 2-11 cm long, adaxially slightly flattened, puberulent or pubescent, less often with scattered ferruginous-erect hairs, slightly enlarged at base; rachis 1.2-5.4 cm long, terete or nearly so, with same indumentum as the petiole; petiolules cylindrical, 2-5 mm long, glabrous, puberulent or pubescent, less often with scattered ferruginous-erect hairs; leaflets 4 or 6, opposite or alternate, chartaceous, adaxially glabrous or sometimes the midvein ferruginous, appressed-pubescent, abaxially glabrous to densely puberulent, very often with midvein and secondaries ferruginous-hirsutulose, ovate, widely oblong, elliptic, or widely elliptic, 4-14.5 × 1.8-6.6 cm, the apex long-acuminate to caudate, the base obtuse, acute, to nearly rounded, sometimes slightly inequilateral, the venation brochidodromus, tertiary veins reticulate. Thyrses racemiform, solitary and supra-axillary or distal and congested, 4-8 cm long; axes sulcate, puberulent, sometimes with glandular papillae; bracts and bracteoles deltate or subulate, < 0.6 mm long; dichasia simple or the flowers solitary (due to aborted lateral flowers) especially toward distal portion of inflorescence; peduncle slightly flattened, 1-2 mm long, with same indumentum as the axes; pedicels 0.5-1 mm long, articulate at base. Calyx pale green, 2-2.5 mm long, puberulent, margins ciliate, with 5 unequal, oblong to ovate sepals, free to the base or nearly so; petals white, rhombate, 2-2.5 mm long, glabrous, the margins ciliate, extended, inrolled (appendage-like) at base, the apex obtuse, the base cuneate; appendages wanting; disc annular, unlobed or slightly lobed, glabrous, ca. 0.5 mm tall; stamens 8, spreading, the filaments of unequal length, 2-3 mm long, sparsely wooly-pubescent to nearly glabrous, the anthers widely elliptic, ca. 0.5 mm long, shortly apiculate or nearly retuse; ovary conical, glabrous, the stigma trilobed, sometimes sparsely pubescent. Fruit ellipsoid, apiculate, 1.8-2 cm long, glabrous, the pericarp coriaceous, granulose, ca. 0.7 mm thick; endocarp glabrous. Seed 1(2) per fruit, ellipsoid, with a thin fleshy testa.