Cerbera odollam Gaertn.

ഒതളം

Family : APOCYNACEAE

Synonym : Cerbera manghas L.

Common Names : Chattankai, Othallam, Odalam, Chiute, Chatthankai, Dog-bane, Grey Milkwood, Sea Mango, Pong Pong Tree

Flowering Period : July-November

Distribution : Indo-Malesia

Habitat : Along the sides of water courses, ponds, in coastal areas and mangrove forests

Uses : The leaves are used externally to treat ringworm. A leaf decoction is added to an aromatic bath after childbirth. The bark, leaves and latex are considered to be emetic and purgative. The bark is used externally to treat ringworm. The seed, and in particular the seed oil, is toxic and strongly purgative. The oil is applied externally to treat scabies and is used as a hair tonic that also kills head lice. The flowers are used as a treatment for haemorrhoids. A fibre is obtained from the inner bark. An oil obtained from the seed is used for lighting and for anointing the head. It is used as a hair tonic.

Key Characters :

Small evergreen trees, to 6 m high; bark greenish-brown; blaze creamy yellow; branchlets stout with prominent leaf scars, latex milky. Leaves simple, alternate, crowned at the end of branches, estipulate; petiole 8-35 mm long, slender, glabrous; lamina 10-25 x 2.5-6.5 cm, lanceolate or oblanceolate; base cuneate or attenuate; apex acuminate or acute; margin entire, glabrous, fleshy, bright green and shiny, membranous on drying; lateral nerves many, close, slender, parallel, looped near the margin forming intramarginal nerve; intercostae reticulate. Flowers bisexual, 5 cm across, white, in pseudoterminal cymes; calyx lobes 5, linear, recurved, eglandular; corolla lobes 5, tube funnel-shaped above the throat with 5 villous scales; stamens 5, small, included, anthers lanceolate, apiculate; disc absent; carpels 2, free, ovules 4 in each cell on both sides of thick placenta. Fruit a drupe, globose or ellipsoid, pericarp green turning rose; seeds 1 or 2 compressed.