Lepisanthes senegalensis (Poir.) Leenhouts

Trees or shrubs, evergreen, 4-6 m tall or more. Branches terete, glabrous. Leaves with petiole to 60 cm, axis strong, stout, grooved; leaflets 3-6 pairs; petiolule ca. 1 cm, stout; blades olive-green when dry, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, 15-40 × 4-14 cm, subleathery, glabrous, base rounded or sometimes nearly cuneate, margin entire, apex acuminate or shortly acuminate. Inflorescences axillary, usually shorter than leaves. Pedicels 1-2 mm. Smaller sepals broadly ovate, 1.2-2 mm; larger ones suborbicular, 2.5-3 mm in diam. Petals 5 or sometimes 4, purplish red, broadly ovate, 4-5 × 3-3.5 mm, apex rounded or subtruncate; scales ciliate. Stamens 8 or sometimes 7; filaments ca. 1.5 mm, middle part slightly inflated, villous; anthers oblong, connectives slightly prominent. Ovary obcordiform, usually 2-lobed, 2-loculed; style short, stout; stigma shallowly 2-lobed. Fruit purplish red; fertile schizocarp ellipsoid, ca. 1.6 × 0.8 cm. Fl. Feb-Mar, fr. May.

Tropical Africa, Himalaya (Nepal to Bhutan), E. India, Ceylon, Burma, to W. & S. China, Malaysia.

300-800 m

Wet valleys. Guangxi, S Yunnan [Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Indochinese peninsula, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, New Guinea, Philippines, Sri Lanka; Africa, Madagascar].

Sapindus senegalensis Poiret in Lamarck, Encycl. 6: 666. 1804; Aphania rubra (Roxburgh) Radlkofer; S. ruber (Roxburgh) Kurz; Scytalia rubra Roxburgh ["rubia"].

senegalensis: of Senegal

Shrub or small to medium-sized tree. Leaves alternate to sub-opposite, bifoliolate; leaflets elliptic, 8-15 cm long, leathery, apex tapering, often curved down; margin entire, wavy. Flowers unisexual on the same tree, in terminal branched sprays, greenish-cream, small. Fruit ovoid, fleshy, c. 2 × 1.2 cm, occasionally 2-lobed, reddish, indehiscent.

From Senegal to Sudan, Ethiopia and south to Angola and Mozambique.

Lepisanthes senegalensis is a tree widespread through tropical Africa and tropical Asia to New Guinea and northern Australia.