Digital Garden

Garcinia xanthochymus Hook.f. ex Anders.

മൊന്തൻപുളി

Family : CLUSIACEAE/GUTTIFERAE

Synonym : Garcinia pictorius (Roxb.) D. Arcy

Common Names : Anavaya, Andoor mavu, Bhaviyam, Monthanpuli, Pinar, Thamalam, Vayirapuli, Egg tree, Gamboge, Mysore Gamboge, Himalayan Garcinia, Sour Mangosteen, Yellow Mangosteen

Flowering Period : Throughout the year

Distribution : Indo-Malesia

Habitat : Mostly cultivated

Uses : Fruit edible - raw or cooked. The thin-skinned fruit is edible but is rather sour. The fruit is antiscorbutic, cholagogue, cooling, emollient and demulcent. Young plants are used as rootstocks for the mangosteen.

Key Characters :

Evergreen trees, to 20 m; bark 6 mm thick, blackish or dark grey, exfoliating in small flakes; blaze creamy-yellow; exudation white turning yellow; branches horizontal, tips drooping; branchlets 4-angular. Leaves simple, opposite, estipulate; petiole 10-30 mm long, angular, rugulose, prominent ligulate projection at base, glabrous; lamina 12-45 x 4-12 cm, linear oblong, oblong or oblong-lanceolate; base cuneate or acute; apex acute or acuminate; margin entire, glabrous, shining, coriaceous; lateral nerves 15-20 pairs, slender, pinnate, arched near the margin forming intramarginal nerves; intercostae reticulate, prominent, secondary laterals prominent. Flowers polygamodioecious, white; male flowers: 1.5 cm across, 4-10 in fascicles, axillary or from the axils of the fallen leaves; pedicels thick, to 2.5 cm long; sepals [4]-5, orbicular-concave, unequal, apex ciliate; petals 5, 8 mm long, orbicular, incurved, spreading, greenish; stamens in 5 broad bundles of 3-5 each, alternating with 5 fleshy glands; anthers bilocular; female flowers: solitary; staminodes few, complanate; ovary ovoid, acuminate, 5 locular, ovules one in each cell; style short; stigmatic rays 5, oblong, spreading, entire. Fruit a berry, yellow, when ripe, 4.5-5.5 x 4-4.5 cm, stigmatic lobes 5; pulp yellow, acidic, seeds 1-2, reniform, 2.5-3 x 2.5 cm, smooth.