Averrhoa bilimbi L.

Tree to 15 m tall, 30 cm diam.; branches ascending, new branches and rachis densely yellow or rusty tomentose. Leaves pseudoverticillate at the top of the branches, 7-20 jugate, ovate to 65 cm long; leaflets alike, discolorous, oblong or elliptical, asymmetrical, 2.5-15 cm long, 1-5 cm wide, the lower leaflets smaller, 1-2 cm long 1-1.5 cm wide, acute or acuminate with a mucro 2 mm long, the base rounded or subcuneate, softly pubescent on both sides, more so beneath and above on the midrib; petiolules fleshy, tomentose; petiole pubescent, to 17 cm long, enlarged at the base. Inflorescences axillary or often cauliflorous on aborted branches, sometimes even on the lower part of the trunk, of cymes forming racemes or panicles, 15-20-flowered, or of solitary flowers, pubescent and glandular; bracts ca. 4 mm long, bracteoles 1.5-2 mm long, both subulate, densely tomentose; pedicels 4-20 mm long, articulate near the middle. Flowers with the sepals 5-2.5 mm long, 1.5-3 mm wide, ovate to elliptical, asymmetrical, acute, mucronate, one internal sepal oblong and obtuse, pubescence appressed and glandular inside and out, green yellow to purplish; petals purplish, free or sometimes connate near the middle, linear spathulate, 10-20 mm long, 2.5-4 mm wide, clawed, caducous, apically with a short caducous cilium and minute glan-dular hairs; stamens 10, nearly free, glabrous, the longer 10 mm and the shorter 4 mm long, the anthers suborbicular, the connective conspicuous; pistils mostly mesostylous, 7.5-12 mm long, the ovary cylindrical, 5-lobate, 4-7.5 mm long, acute, lengthened-into the styles, the styles cylindrical, ca. 2 mm long, 2-lobed or truncate, densely appressed pilose, the hairs yellow, straight, ascending, the stigma inconspicuous, liguliform or subulate, the carpels with (1-3-)4-7 ovules. Berry oblong, to 7.5 cm long, 3.5 cm in diam., 5-lobate or smooth, in transverse section subcircular or pentagonal, the base roundish, the apex lobulate; seeds 4-7 per carpel.

A tropical plant. It suits the hot, wet tropical lowlands. The tree is drought resistant. It will grow from sea level up to at least 750 m altitude in the tropics. It prefers well composted, moist soil, in a protected, partly shaded position. It is frost tender. In the Cairns Botanical Gardens. It suits hardiness zones 10-12. At MARDI.

Uses. In the Malay Peninsula the leaves are used as a paste against itches, eaten against syphilis and a decoction is drunk after childbirth. In Java the leaves are used against mumps, rheumatism and pimples, against piles; a decoction of the flowers is used against cough and thrush. The fruit juice is generally used against fevers, scurvy, beri-beri, biliousness, coughs and piles; it also removes stains from laundry, hands and weapons. See KOORDERS & VALETON (1903), HEYNE (1927), OCHSE & BAKHUIZEN (1931), BURKILL (1935), and QUISUMBING (1951). Fruits and flowers are edible but more acid than those of A. carambola.

Trees are mostly grown from seeds. It grows wild in secondary forest in many coastal areas. It can also be grown by air layering.