Croton laccifer L. - EUPHORBIACEAE

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Botanical descriptions Ecology Distribution Literatures

Botanical descriptions :

Habit : Trees up to 10 m tall.
Trunk & Bark : Bark smooth, brownish; blaze yellowish.
Branches and Branchlets : Branchlets terete, densely stellate hairy.
Leaves : Leaves simple, alternate, spiral; petiole 0.8-3 cm long, stellate hairy; lamina 3.8-13 x 2-6 cm, broadly ovate, apex acute to acuminate, base subcordate, irregularly serrate or crenate, stellate hairy on both surfaces, trinerved at base; secondary_nerves 4-6 pairs; tertiary_nerves strongly reticulate; stipitate glands 2 pairs, at the junction of lamina and petiole beneath.
Inflorescence / Flower : Inflorescence racemes with male flowers towards apex and female flowers at base.
Fruit and Seed : Capsule, 0.8-1 cm diameter, subglobose, white stellate hairy; seeds 3.

Ecology :

Understorey trees in high elevation evergreen forests, between 1300 and 2300 m.

Distribution :

Peninsular India and Sri Lanka; in the Western_Ghats- South and Central Sahyadris.

Literatures :

Sp. Pl. 1005. 1753 (lacciferum); Gamble, Fl. Madras 2: 1315. 1993 (re. ed); Sasidharan, Biodiversity documentation for Kerala- Flowering Plants, part 6: 413. 2004; Saldanha, Fl. Karnataka 2: 127. 1996.

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