Parashorea stellata Kurz - DIPTEROCARPACEAE

Synonym : Shorea stellata (Kurz) Dyer
Shorea cinerea C.E.C. Fisch.
Parashorea poilanei Tardieu

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Botanical descriptions Habitat and ecology Distribution

Botanical descriptions :

Diagnostic characters : Large evergreen trees with buttresses. Bark smooth, hooped and with star shaped lenticels at trunk base. Exudate resinous, yellowish. Leaves with stellate hairs below. Fruit a winged nut with 5 long wings more or less the same length.
Habit : Evergreen tree, 25-40 m height, crown globose, late branched.
Trunk & bark : Bole cylindrical, straight, sometimes slightly twisted, buttresses present, irregular sometimes running on the ground. Bark smooth, hooped, with large stellate lenticels, yellowish brown to greyish brown, inner bark fibrous.
Branches and branchlets or twigs : Twigs terete and glabrous becoming thin and hard when mature.
Exudates : Exudates resinous, yellowish.
Leaves : Leaves simple alternate, distichous, base rounded with many pointed glands and sparsely and stellately hairy.
Midrib raised above, primary vein single, secondary veins oblique to the midrib, widely parallel, tertiary veins finely reticulate. Petiole puberulent with stellate hairs. Stipule large and caducous.
Inflorescences or flowers : Flowers cream in terminal or axillary panicles, bract linear to lanceolate. Buds globose to oblong, velvety.
Fruits : Fruit is a winged nut, 1 cm long, globose to ovoid, reddish when young, finely hairy, five oblong to lanceolate wings more or less the same length, slightly narrowed at base and blunt at tip.
Seeds : Seed 1.

Habitat and ecology :

In mixed and open degraded forests on pour soil from 300 to 800 m altitude. Flowering period : April-June; fruiting time: August - October.

Distribution :

Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Malay Peninsula , Thailand, Vietnam and Laos (Khammouane, Vientiane provinces).

Remark/notes/uses :
Timber used in light construction and for houses, flooring, plywood, furniture and cabinetwork.

Specimens studied :
BT 39 (Herbarium of Faculty of Sciences-NUoL, NHN-Leiden and CIRAD-Montpellier).

Literature :
Flore du Cambodge, du Laos et du Viêtnam. 1960-2003. Vol. 25. Muséum national d'histoire naturelle, Paris, France.
Rachun Pooma & Mark Newman. 2001. Checklist of Dipterocarpaceae in Thailand, Thai Forest Bulletin, no 29. The Forest Herbarium, Royal Forest Department, Bangkok, Thailand.
Dung, Vu Van. 1996. Vietnam Forest Trees. Agriculture Publishing House, Hanoi, Vietnam.
B. Svengsuksa & J.E. Vidal. 1997. Les Dipterocarpacées du Laos. Université Nationale du Laos, Vientiane, Laos.
Gardner S., Sidisunthorn P. & Anusarnsunthorn V. 2000. A field guide to Forest Trees of Northern Thailand. Kobfai Publishing Project. Bangkok. Thailand.
Dipterocarps of Vietnam. 2005. Forest Science Institute of Vietnam. Agricultural Publishing House, Hanoi, Vietnam.

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