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

Terminalia morobensis Coode

Contributions of Herbarium Australiense Vol. 2: 23 (1973) Fig. 5.

Other Literature: M.J.E. Coode, Handbooks of the Flora of Papua New Guinea 95 (1978) Fig. 21-22.

Family: Combretaceae
Dicotyledon

Timber Group: Major exportable hardwood

Field Characters: Large canopy tree (up to 40 high) or Small sub-canopy tree; Bole cylindrical (up to 60 cm diam.); straight (bole up to 30 m long); buttresses buttresses present; spines spines absent; aerial roots aerial roots absent; stilt roots stilt roots absent; Bark red (pale pinkish), grey, or brown, slightly rough or smooth, cracked (slightly cracks vertical, c. 20 mm apart), pustular, or tessellated, lenticels elongated vertically; Subrhytidome (under-bark) dark red; less than 25 mm thick, 20.0 (c.); bark blaze with two layers; faintly to non-aromatic; outer blaze pink or dark red, with stripes (cream-coloured), fibrous; inner blaze pink or dark red, with stripes (cream-coloured), fibrous; bark exudate (sap) present or absent, colourless, not readily flowing (spotty), colour not changing on exposure to air, not sticky; terminal buds not enclosed by leaves.

Indumentum: Complex hairs absent; stinging hairs absent; mature twig indumentum (hairs) present when young or later absent, hairs dense to sparse.

Leaves: Leaves clustered at end of 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 broadest above middle, (10.0-) 17.0-25.0 cm, 8.0-11.0 cm; symmetric, entire, not dissected or lobed, obtuse or sub acute, venation pinnate, secondary veins open, prominent, intramarginal veins absent; leaves lower surface pale green (with orange-brown hairs), upper surface green (glossy), indumentum (hairs) present, indumentum (hairs) dense; absent; domatia absent; stipules absent.

Flowers: Inflorescence axillary, flowers on an unbranched axis, cones absent; flowers unisexual and bisexual, unisexual with male and female flowers on the same plant, stalked, flowers with many planes of symmetry, 13.0-25.0 mm long, diameter small (up to10 mm diam.) (c. 10 mm diam.); perianth present, with all sepals and/or petals (hence tepals) similar, inner perianth white or pale yellow or cream-coloured; 5, some or partly joined; stamens 10-15, present, free of each other, free of the perianth; ovary inferior, carpels joined (when more than one), locules 1; styles solitary, 1.

Fruits: Infrutescence arranged on unbranched axis, fruit (50.0-) 55.0-60.0 (-70.0) mm long, red or brown, not spiny, fleshy, simple, indehiscent, drupe; seeds 1, much more than 10 mm long, not winged, broad (as wide as long), seed 1-10 mm diam.

Distribution: Morobe or Western.

Botanical records in PNGplants database Map details

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