Description:
Small dioecious trees; branchlets slightly angular; buds in shoot axils, not leaf axils; indumentum simple. Leaves alternate, simple, serrulate, asymmetrical and +/- cuneate at base; stipules minute. Inflorescences racemose, racemes on old wood fasciculate; female flowers solitary or paired, sometimes in shoot axils. Calyx cupular, truncate or faintly toothed. Petals 5, valvate below, faintly imbricate above, glabrous. Stamens 10, in 2 whorls of 5, 5 outer ones episepalous with long filaments, 5 inner ones epipetalous with short filaments; anthers basifixed; longitudinally dehiscent. Disc 0. Ovary (2)3- or 4-locular; ovule 1 per locule, pendent, orthotropous; stigmas (2)3 or 4, undivided, reflexed; pistillode present in male flowers. Fruit drupaceous, (2)3- or 4-seeded, +/- 50 mm in diameter, very tardily dehiscent into (2)3 or 4 valves, leaving a large tri- or tetrapterygoid columella. Seeds obtriangular, flattened; testa thinly coriaceous, greyish; endosperm copious, oleaginous; cotyledons cordate, truncate.
Distribution:
Monotypic: Panda oleosa Pierre, west trop. Africa; sthn trop. Afr.: Angola.
Source:
SSTA
Classification:
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