Barry Conn (NSW) & Kipiro Damas (LAE).
Guide to trees of Papua New Guinea
Copyright held by the authors, National Herbarium of New South Wales, and Papua New Guinea National Herbarium

Terminalia impediens Coode

Kew Bulletin Vol. 23: 308 (1969) Fig. 6.

Other Literature: M.J.E. Coode, Handbooks of the Flora of Papua New Guinea 80-82 (1978) Fig. 19-34.

Family: Combretaceae
Dicotyledon

Timber Group: Major exportable hardwood

Field Characters: Emergent tree or Large canopy tree; Bole cylindrical; straight; buttresses buttresses present (often buttresses up to 3 m high); spines spines absent; aerial roots aerial roots absent; stilt roots stilt roots absent; Bark grey, rough, scaly or flaky or peeling (in irregular flakes); Subrhytidome (under-bark) brown; less than 25 mm thick; bark blaze with two layers; faintly to non-aromatic; outer blaze pink or brown, markings absent; inner blaze white or yellow (pale (straw-coloured), markings absent; terminal buds not enclosed by leaves.

Indumentum: Complex hairs absent; stinging hairs absent; mature twig indumentum (hairs) absent.

Leaves: Leaves clustered at end of branches, spiral (leaves occurring singly at a node and arranged spirally up the branchlet), simple (a leaf composed of a single blade); petiole present, not winged, attached to base of leaf blade, not swollen; leaves broadest above middle, 15.0-26.0 (-45.0) cm, 5.0-12.0 (-20.0) cm; symmetric, entire, not dissected or lobed, usually obtuse or sometimes acute, venation pinnate, secondary veins open, prominent, intramarginal veins absent; leaves lower surface pale green, upper surface green, indumentum (hairs) absent or present, indumentum (hairs) dense to sparse; absent; domatia absent; stipules absent.

Flowers: Inflorescence axillary, flowers on an unbranched axis, cones absent; flowers unisexual and bisexual, unisexual with male and female flowers on the same plant, stalked, flowers with many planes of symmetry, 7.0 (c.) mm long, diameter small (up to10 mm diam.); perianth present (strongly aromatic of honey and resin), with all sepals and/or petals (hence tepals) similar, inner perianth white (cream-coloured); 5, some or partly joined; stamens 10, present, free of each other, joined to the perianth; ovary inferior, carpels joined (when more than one), locules 1; styles solitary, 1.

Fruits: Infrutescence arranged on unbranched axis, fruit 70.0-90.0 mm long, red, not spiny, fleshy, simple, indehiscent, drupe; seeds 1, much more than 10 mm long (including dense hard stone), not winged, broad (as wide as long), seed more than 10 mm diam.

Distribution: West Sepik, Madang, Morobe, Gulf & Central.

Botanical records in PNGplants database Map details

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