Melicoccus bijugatus
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Melicoccus bijugatus or the honeyberry , Mamoncillo , Quenepa (e) , is a tree in the soap tree family from Venezuela and Colombia to the Caribbean and Central America .
description
Melicoccus bijugatus grows as an evergreen , rather slow-growing tree to about 20 meters or more high. The trunk diameter reaches over 60 centimeters. The bark is relatively smooth and brownish-gray.
The alternate and stalked leaves are pinnate in pairs with only up to 4 leaflets . The rachis is partly winged and at the end it is formed with a very small, awkward and often sloping "process". The entire, egg-shaped and short-stalked, thin-leather, bald leaflets are up to 10-15 centimeters long and tapered to rounded or pointed. The stipules are missing.
Melicoccus bijugatus is monoecious or dioecious dioecious . Terminal and multi-flowered panicles with racemose side branches are formed. The pleasantly fragrant and stalked, 4–5-fold, very small, unisexual flowers with a double envelope are greenish-yellow. The obovate petals are up to 2.5 millimeters in size and ciliate. There are about 8 stamens . The unilocular ovary is upper constant with almost sedentary, zweilappiger scar . There is a fleshy, bald discus . The female flowers have staminodes, the male a pistillode.
The green, egg-shaped to ellipsoidal, about 2.5-3.5 centimeters large fruits are smooth, leathery, waxy and sometimes pale-black. The large, cream-colored seed is smooth and finely textured and encased in a yellowish to orange, gelatinous, juicy sarcotesta .
use
The aromatic, juicy fruits are edible. They are used raw, cooked or in drinks.
The bark and leaves are used medicinally.
The medium-weight wood is not durable, it is only rarely used.
literature
- FG Davies, B. Verdcourt: Flora of Tropical East Africa. Sapindaceae, Balkema, 1998, ISBN 90-6191-380-2 , p. 3.
- Alain H. Liogier : Descriptive Flora of Puerto Rico and Adjacent Islands. Vol. III, Universidad de Puerto Rico, 1994, ISBN 0-8477-2336-4 , pp. 59 ff.
- Elbert L. Little, Frank H. Wadsworth: Common Trees of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Agriculture Handbook No. 249, USDA, 1964, pp. 306 f.
- P. Acevedo-Rodríguez: Melicocceae (Sapindaceae): Melicoccus and Talisia. In: Flora Neotropica. Vol. 87, Melicocceae (Sapindaceae): Melicoccus and Talisia, 2003, pp. 1-178, JSTOR 4393917 .
- K. Kubitzki : The Families and Genera of Vascular Plants. Vol. X: Flowering Plants Eudicots , Springer, 2011, ISBN 978-3-642-14396-0 , pp. 357-407, online at researchgate.net.
Web links
- Melicoccus bijugatus at Useful Tropical Plants.
- Melicoccus bijugatus in CABI Invasive Species Compendium.