1392

 

        Diospyros ebenum J.Koenig ex Retz.

Synonym	:	Diospyros assimilisBedd.
Family	:	Ebenaceae
Local name	:	English- Indian Ebony Malayalam-  Karingali
Flowering and fruiting period	:	February-April
Distribution	:	Peninsular India and Sri Lanka
Distribution in Kerala	:	Kollam, Idukki
Habitat	:	Dry deciduous forests
Uses		The edible fruits are eaten only in times of famine. It have medicinal properties as attenuate and lithontropic. The pounded bark and leaves are employed as a blistering plaster. The heartwood is very black; it is clearly demarcated from the light yellowish grey sapwood that is often streaked with black. The texture is very fine, close and even; the grain straight. .
Key botanical characters: Evergreen dioecious trees, to 15 m high, bark black or grey-black, rough, peeling off in small rectangular pieces, fissured, brittle; blaze yellow; branchlets slender, apical part sparsely minutely adpressedpilose or glabrous. Leaves simple, alternate, estipulate; petiole 4-10 mm long, slender, glabrous; lamina 4.5-15 x 4-7 cm, elliptic-oblong, oblong, oblong-lanceolate, obovate or obovate-oblong, base cuneate or acute, apex obtuse, emarginate or subacute, margin entire, glabrous, coriaceous; lateral nerves 5-11 pairs, pinnate, prominent, basal pairs opposite, intercostae reticulate, prominent, pellucid. Flowers unisexual, subsessile, greenish-yellow; male flowers: 3-15 in short, axillary, umbellate clusters; peduncle densely tomentose; pedicel 3 mm; calyx cupular, glabrous; lobes 4, ovate, spreading, margin ciliate; corolla 7 mm long, 1 cm across, tubular to salver-shaped; lobes 4, ovate-oblong, 6 mm long; stamens 6-12, unequal, in uneven groups; filaments 1.5-3.5 mm long; anthers linear, connectives crested, apiculate; pistillode linear to 2 mm; female flowers: solitary, axillary, pedicel to 3 mm; calyx cupular, mouth densely tomentose; lobes 4, ovate, spreading, subacute; corolla 3 mm across, tubular; tube 6 mm; lobes 4, each 6 mm, acute, reflexed; staminodes 8 with double anthers; ovary superior, 4.5 x 4 mm, globose, 8-celled, ovules 1-in each cell; styles 4; stigma capitellate. Fruit a berry, 2 x 1.8 cm, subglobose, with short apical beak; calyx enlarged and forming a shallow wooden cup; reflexed; seeds 3-8, black; endosperm equable.