Digital Garden

Psydrax dicoccos Gaertn.

ഇരുമ്പറപ്പൻ

Family : RUBIACEAE

Synonym : Canthium dicoccum (Gaertn.) Merr.

Common Names : Irumbarappan

Flowering Period : February-May

Distribution : Native range is South India, Sri Lanka, Indo-China to South China and Malesia

Habitat : Evergreen, semi-evergreen and dry deciduous forests, also in the plains

Uses : The wood is white or light brown, hard, close and even grained. A fine wood, it is used for agricultural purposes, cutlery etc

Key Characters :

Evergreen trees, to 12 m high, bark white, corky. Leaves simple, opposite, distichous, 7-12 x 2.4-4.5 cm, elliptic, elliptic-lanceolate, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, apex acuminate, base cuneate or acute, margin entire, recurved, glabrous, shiny coriaceous; stipules interpetiolar, cuneate, triangular, cuspidate; petiole 4-10 mm, stout, glabrous; lateral nerves 2-4 pairs, pinnate, prominent, ascending; intercostae reticulate, obscure beneath, domatia present. Flowers bisexual, pentamerous in axillary cymes, 10 mm long. Calyx tube short, lobes ciliate. Corolla lobes 5, oblong, reflexed, tube densely villous. Stamens 5; filaments short, disc round, cushion like. Ovary 2-celled, inferior; ovules one in each cell, pendulous; style 14 mm long, glabrous. Fruit a drupe, 0.8 cm long, globose, compressed, glabrous; pyrene rugose.