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

Maranthes corymbosa Blume

Flora van Nederlandsch Indië 89 (1825)

Other Literature: J.J. Havel, Forest Botany, Part 2 Botanical Taxonomy 99 (1975) Fig. 26.

Family: Chrysobalanaceae
Dicotyledon

Timber Group: Minor hardwood

Field Characters: Large canopy tree (up to 40 m); Bole cylindrical (up to c. 60 cm diam.); straight (bole 10-20 m long); buttresses buttresses absent; spines spines absent; aerial roots aerial roots absent; stilt roots stilt roots absent; Bark pale grey or pale brown, rough or almost smooth, scaly or flaky, peeling, or slightly tessellated; Subrhytidome (under-bark) dark red; less than 25 mm thick; bark blaze consisting of one layer; faintly to non-aromatic; outer blaze red (brownish); inner blaze brownish red; bark exudate (sap) present; terminal buds not enclosed by leaves.

Indumentum: Complex hairs absent; stinging hairs absent; mature twig indumentum (hairs) present or absent (with lenticels), hairs dense to sparse.

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, swollen (with pair of glands near junction with lamina); leaves broadest at or near middle, 8.0-15.0 cm, 3.0-6.5 cm; symmetric, entire, not dissected or lobed, acute to mucronate, venation pinnate, secondary veins open, prominent, intramarginal veins absent; leaves lower surface green, upper surface dark green (glossy (to sub-glossy), indumentum (hairs) present, indumentum (hairs) dense to sparse (lower surface); absent; domatia absent; stipules absent.

Flowers: Inflorescence terminal to axillary (upper axillary), flowers on a branched axis, cones absent; flowers bisexual, stalked (shortly), flowers with many planes of symmetry, 3.0-8.0 mm long, diameter small (up to10 mm diam.) (5-8 mm diam.); perianth present, with distinct sepals and petals whorls, inner perianth white; 5, free (joined to a tubular hypanthium) or some or partly joined (by misinterpretation); stamens 25-40, present, free of each other, free of the perianth or joined to the perianth (by misinterpretation: appearing to be joined to corolla tube, actually joined to top of hypanthium); ovary superior, carpels joined (when more than one), locules 2; styles solitary, 1.

Fruits: Infrutescence arranged on branched axis, fruit (24.0-) (15-20 mm diam.) 30.0-40.0 mm long, 15.0-20.0 mm diam., orange, not spiny, non-fleshy, simple, indehiscent, drupe; seeds 2 (1 per locule), much more than 10 mm long (12-17 mm long), not winged, narrow (longer than wide), seed 1-10 mm diam. (c. 5 mm diam.).

Distribution: West Sepik, East Sepik, Madang, Morobe, Western, Central, Northern, Milne Bay, Papuan Islands, New Britain, Manus & Bougainville.

Botanical records in PNGplants database Map details

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