English Lao
Botanical descriptions Habitat and ecology Distribution
| Diagnostic characters : | Polymorphic leaves, rhomboid when mature, margin glandular dentate with two nectarines at leaf base and presence of glands on leaf underneath. Fruit spiny and bilobed. |
| Habit : | Small evergreen tree, 10 – 15 m high. Branches ascending to main trunk. |
| Trunk & bark : | Bark smooth, light brown, outer bark thin, inner bark red. . |
| Branches and branchlets or twigs : | Branches slender, terete, finely velvety, silver to yellowish-brown, pubescent. |
| Exudates : | Black sap. . |
| Leaves : | Leaves simple, alternate, 7-15 by 5.5-10 cm, ovate when young then rhombic-elliptic when mature, apex with long tip, rounded at base, margin glandular dentate, glaucous below with fawn short stellate hairs and granular glandular, glabrescent on upper side, occasionally with two inconspicuous nectaries at blade insertion. Midrib flat on upper surface, three basal primary veins, secondary veins oblique to the midrib, widely parallel, tertiary veins oblique. Petiole slender, 4-5 cm long, finely pubescent. Stipules pubescent, erect, soon falling off. |
| Inflorescences or flowers : | Flowers unisexual on different trees, axillary, pale yellowish, grouped in racemes, with bract and bracteole; bract deeply dissected and leaf-like. Pedicels 5 mm long. |
| Fruits : | Fruit is a capsule, bilobed, 1.2 by 0.4 cm, with short spines bearing irritant hairs, calyx persistent. |
| Seeds : | Seeds 2-3 per fruit, globose, rugose, black. |