Pittosporum dasycaulon Miq. - PITTOSPORACEAE

Vernacular names : Malayalam: Kasumaram

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Botanical descriptions Ecology Distribution Status: Literatures

Botanical descriptions :

Habit : Small trees up to 8 m tall.
Trunk & Bark : Bark brownish, lenticellate; blaze whitish.
Branches and branchlets : Branchlets slender, terete, minutely pubescent.
Leaves : Leaves simple, alternate, spiral, usually crowded at apex; petiole 0.5-1.5 cm long, planoconvex in cross section, pubescent; lamina 7-12.8 x 3-4.3 cm, elliptic to elliptic-oblanceolate, apex acuminate, base cuneate to decurrent, margin entire, pubescent, glabrous when mature, chartaceous, midrib flat above; secondary_nerves ca 8 pairs; tertiary_nerves closely reticulate.
Inflorescence / Flower : Inflorescence terminal, umbels of short racemes.
Fruit and Seed : Capsule, loculicidal, 2-valved, 1 cm long, pubescent, drying black; seeds 4, orange to reddish.

Ecology :

Trees along margins of evergreen forests between 400 and 850 m.

Distribution :

Endemic to the Western_Ghats- South and Central Sahyadris.

Status: :

Rare (Ahmedullah & Nayar, 1987).

Literatures :

Anal. Bot. Ind. 3: 5. 1852; Gamble, Fl. Madras 1: 55. 1997 (re. ed); Sasidharan, Biodiversity documentation for Kerala- Flowering Plants, part 6: 33. 2004; Saldanha, Fl. Karnataka 1: 354. 1984; Cook, Fl. Bombay 1: 58. 1903; Almeida, Fl. Maharashtra 1:67. 1996.

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