Euclea pseudebenus
Click on each image to see a larger version and details of the record (Click here to see images of this plant from Kyffhäuser)
Image 1
Habit
22 Mar 2013
Image 2
Leaves and fruit
22 Mar 2013
Image 3
Dried stump showing
black heartwood
22 Mar 2013
Image 4
Habit
20 Feb 2018
Image 5
Leaves
20 Feb 2018
| Family: | Ebenaceae |
| Full name: | Euclea pseudebenus E.Mey. ex A.DC. |
| ID status: | Fairly certain |
| Afrikaans common name(s): | Swartebbe, Valsebbehout, Tsabiboom, Ebbeboom, Ebbehout, Abikwa, Sabbiboom, Basterebbehout, Swart ebbehout, Embolo |
| English common name(s): | Black ebony, Cape ebony, Wild ebony, False ebony, Ebony tree |
| Synonym(s): | Diospyros pseudebenus (E.Mey.) Parm. Euclea angustifolia Benth. |
| Status: | Native |
| Description: | Trees 3-9 m high or occasionally shrubs, with characteristically drooping branches, trunks 8-30 cm in diam. with a rough, dark bark; branches drooping, virgate, little to much branched, bark grey, or yellow or reddish-brown, young parts densely glandular and sparsely hairy. Leaves alternate, pale, usually somewhat glaucous green, thickly coriaceous, linear, often slightly falcate, 2-5-5 cm long and 2-5 mm wide; base narrowly cuneate; apex acuminate, mucionate; nervation not prominent above, midrib and margins raised below; margin often subinvolute in young leaves, otherwise quite flat, petioles very short, not exceeding 2 mm; stipules absent. Inflorescence axillary, glandular and sparsely to densely hairy; male inflorescence 3-7-flowered, female flowers usually solitary, occasionally borne in a 2-3-flowered inflorescence. Male flowers 3 mm long. Calyx about 0.167-0.25 of length of corolla, densely but shortly villous, lobes 5-6, deltoid. Corolla globose to urceolate, densely but shortly villous outside and in the upper half on the inside, shallowly 5-6 lobed on the rim, lobes ovate, somewhat reflexed. Stamens 12-20, in two rows, the inner and outer opposing each other, often joined together in pairs, the inner practically sessile; filaments glabrous, flattened, up to 1 mm long; anthers lanceolate, sparsely hairy towards the apex. Ovary rudimentary, hairy. Female flowers 2 mm long, slightly smaller than the males. Calyx and corolla as in the male flowers. Staminodes absent. Ovary ovoid, densely sericeous, situated on a fimbriate disc, usually 4-celled (or 2-celled due to incomplete septa) with a single pendulous ovule in each cell; styles 2, very short, truncate. Fruit globose, fleshy and black when ripe, glabrescent, 5-8 mm diam., usually one-seeded. Seeds globose, 3-5 mm in diam., divided into three parts by two thin lines and a groove; endosperm flinty, grey; embryo somewhat curved. (from JSTOR Global Plants website / Flora of Southern Africa) Shrub 4–8 ft. high, or a tree much branched throughout; trunk 10–12 in. in diam.; branchlets slender, pubescent or glabrescent, leafy; bark thin; periderm subepidermal; leaves alternate, entire, linear, narrowed at both ends, coriaceous, glabrous or puberulous, 1-nerved, moderately reticulate, 1–2.25 in. long, 0.1– 0.25 in. broad; petiole 0.05– 0.143 in. long; cymes racemose, axillary, shorter than the leaves, pubescent; flowers dioecious. Male racemes 0.25– 0.5 in. long, 3–7-flowered; pedicels slender, 0.0526– 0.2 in. long; flowers 0.1– 0.143 in. long, usually pentamerous, rarely hexamerous, calyx pubescent, about half the length of the corolla, cleft half-way down; lobes ovate-deltoid; corolla globose-urceolate, shortly lobed, rather fleshy, white, hoary-tomentose outside; stamens 12–20, inserted at the bottom of the corolla; anthers erect, hirsute or glabrous; filaments short; pistil obsolete. Female racemes very short, 0.167– 0.333 in. long, 1–3-flowered; pedicels 0.0625– 0.143 in. long; flowers 0.125– 0.143 in. long, pentamerous; calyx shortly 5–6-lobed; corolla urceolate-subglobose, very densely hirsute outside, slightly hairy inside about the throat, otherwise glabrous, with very short, broad obtuse lobes; staminodes 0; ovary sessile, globose, densely shaggy, 4-celled; styles 2, glabrous; ovules solitary; fruit globose, glabrescent, 0.2– 0.25 in. in diam., black-bluish, drupaceous, a little juicy, edible, sweet and slightly astringent; seeds solitary, marked with three depressed lines. (from JSTOR Global Plants website / Flora Capensis) |
| Link(s) |
African Plant Database
JSTOR Plant Science Kew Herbarium Catalogue BGBM Berlin-Dahlem - Virtual Herbarium Züricher Herbarien iNaturalist (Namibia / Alex Dreyer) iNaturalist (Namibia) iNaturalist (southern Africa) Flora of Zimbabwe Fleurs de notre Terre - Galerie Namibie Tree Atlas of Namibia |
| Content last updated: | 18 Apr 2024 |
