Barry Conn (NSW) & Kipiro Damas (LAE).
Guide to trees of Papua New Guinea
Copyright held by the authors, National Herbarium of New South Wales, and Papua New Guinea National Herbarium

Ficus polyantha Warb.

Nachträge zur Flora der Deutschen Schutzgebiete in der Südsee 250

Other Literature: C.C. Berg & E.J.H. Corner, Flora Malesiana, Series 1 156 (2005)

Family: Moraceae
Dicotyledon

Timber Group: Commercial hardwood Tradename: Fig

Field Characters: Emergent tree (up to 50 m high); Bole markedly fluted (usually greater than 60 cm diam.); straight (almost bole up to 30 m long) or crooked; buttresses buttresses present (buttresses up to 2 m high); spines spines absent; aerial roots aerial roots absent; stilt roots stilt roots absent; Bark brown, rough or smooth, pustular, lenticels elongated vertically; Subrhytidome (under-bark) yellow; less than 25 mm thick, 15.0; bark blaze consisting of one layer; strongly aromatic; resinous/linament-like; outer blaze pale orange or pale brown, with stripes, granular without splinters; inner blaze pale orange or pale brown, with stripes, granular without splinters; bark exudate (sap) present, white/milky, flowing, colour not changing on exposure to air, sticky; terminal buds not enclosed by leaves.

Indumentum: Complex hairs absent; stinging hairs absent; mature twig indumentum (hairs) absent.

Leaves: Leaves spaced along branches, spiral (leaves occurring singly at a node and arranged spirally up the branchlet), simple (a leaf composed of a single blade); petiole present, not winged, attached to base of leaf blade, not swollen; leaves equally broad throughout much of length, (10.0-) 20.0-28.0 (-32.0) cm, (4.0-) 8.0-12.0 cm; symmetric, entire, not dissected or lobed, sub acute or slightly acuminate, venation pinnate, secondary veins open, prominent, intramarginal veins absent; leaves lower surface green or pale green, upper surface dark green, indumentum (hairs) absent; absent; domatia absent (cystoliths present only on lower surface); stipules present, joined, joined across twigs, encircling the twig, leafy, not fringed, large (20-70 mm long, rarely as short as 10 mm).

Flowers: Inflorescence axillary (synconia/figs), flowers single (syconium/fig solitary), flowers arising from a single point (with syconium/fig in pairs), or flowers on an unbranched axis (flowers in a synconium/fig), cones absent; flowers unisexual, unisexual with male and female flowers on the same plant, stalked (flowers shortly pedicellate; synconium/fig with peduncle 2-15 mm long) or not stalked (flowers initially sessile or subsessile), flowers completely asymmetric, with many planes of symmetry (synconium/fig), or with one plane of symmetry (male and female flowers), 1.0-1.5 mm long, diameter small (up to10 mm diam.) (up to c. 1 mm diam.); perianth present, with all sepals and/or petals (hence tepals) similar (membranous), inner perianth red; 3, free or some or partly joined (shortly at base); stamens 1 (male flowers), present, free of the perianth; ovary superior, carpels solitary, locules 1; styles solitary (female flowers) or absent (male flowers), 1.

Fruits: Infrutescence arranged on unbranched axis (syconium/fig), fruit 10.0-15.0 mm long, (10.0-) 15.0-30.0 mm diam., yellow, not spiny, fleshy, syconium (fig), indehiscent, achene or syconium (fig); seeds 100 (per synconium - fig), barely visible (to 1 mm long) (up to c. 1 mm long), not winged, broad (as wide as long), seed less than 1 mm diam.

Distribution: East Sepik, Madang, Morobe, Southern Highlands, New Britain & New Ireland.

Botanical records in PNGplants database Map details

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