Tree up to 10 m, up to 15 cm in diam. Outer bark smooth or lenticellate, brown or red, soft; inner bark red or reddish-brown, soft; cambium pink; sapwood pale brown, white or reddish-brown. Twigs densely covered with orange brown or reddish-brown peltate scales which sometimes have a fimbriate margin. Leaves simple, 5–23 cm long, 2–6,5(–8) cm wide, brown or greenish-brown when dry; apex acuminate, base cuneate, with numerous scales like those on the twigs on the midrib below and scattered or nu-merous on the rest of that surface and sometimes with paler brown scales in between; veins 5–18 on each side of the midrib; petioles 1–3 cm. Male inflorescence up to 19 cm long and 9 cm wide; peduncle 3–7 mm, peduncle, rachis and branches densely covered with scales like those on the twigs. Male flowers 1–1.5 mm long and wide, pedicel 0.3–1 mm, the pedicel and subtending branchlet densely covered with peltate scales which have a fimbriate margin. Calyx densely covered with scales like those on the twigs on the outside. Petals 5 (or 6). Staminal tube 0.5–0.6 mm high, 1 mm wide, cup-shaped with the margin incurved, thickened below the anthers; anthers 5, 0.2–0.3 mm long and wide, pointing towards the centre of the flower. Female inflorescence either c. 2.5 cm long and 1 cm wide with few branches or c. 8 cm long and 4 cm wide and more branched; peduncle 1–6 mm. Female flowers sometimes with peltate or stellate scales on the outside of petals; staminal tube 0.5–1 mm high and c. 1 mm wide, the anthers c. 0.5 mm long and wide; otherwise like the male. Infructescence 5–11 cm long, 4–5.5 cm wide, with c. 3 fruits. Fruits c. 1.8 cm long and 1.5 cm wide, dark brown, reddish-brown, pale orange or yellow, densely covered with scales like those on the twigs on the outside, indehiscent; locules 1 or 2, each containing one arillate seed.
Dense primary forest; more open, secondary formations; near mangroves; growing on sandy alluvial soils, sands, limestone, clay, volcanic clayey sands; at elevations up to 1,400 metres.
Home