Source:
SSA
Description:
Evergreen scandent shrubs to lax trees; branchlets terete, often reduced to axillary spines. Leaves alternate, rarely subopposite, petiolate; eglandular, elliptic to elliptic-ovate; stipules conspicuous. Flowers 5-merous, borne in cymose, few-flowered inflorescences; bracts minute, deltoid, caducous; receptacle hemispherical with calyx and androecium borne at rim. Sepals valvate in bud, deltoid, spreading. Petals 0. Stamens erect; anthers incurved, 2-thecous, dorsifixed, versatile. Disc thick and fleshy. Ovary 3-locular, entirely immersed in and adnate to disc and receptacle; ovules subsessile on basal placentas, 1 per locule; styles 3, free, tapering off terminally; stigma indistinct. Fruit capsular, faintly 3-coccous with stipe and basal part of capsule (receptacle) persistent. Seeds 1 per locule, oblong-obovate; testa hard and shiny; embryo flat, with fleshy, broadly elliptical cotyledons; endosperm abundant. x = 8 (polyploidy).
Distribution:
Species 1: Colubrina nicholsonii A.E. van Wyk & Schrire, three small populations in Pondoland (Eastern Cape): Daza and Mtentu River populations are protected in the Mkambati Game Reserve, third population in riverine forest along Mpunzaana River.
Classification:
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