Chisocheton cumingianus Harms

Tree to 37 m; bole to 14 m, 150 cm diam.; buttresses to 3 m tall, 2 m out or bole fluted to 10 m. Bark scaly, pale grey-brown; inner bark chestnut brown; sapwood straw. Limbs with conspicuous cicatrices. Leafy twigs 5–7 mm diam., dark brownish black, smooth but conspicuously lenticellate, sometimes with white latex, rarely myrmecophilous (and then sometimes the ant chamber housing scale insects, e.g. Coode 5454 in K). Innovations ± rusty pubescent. Leaves to 120 cm, pseudogemmulate, crowded in dense terminal spirals; petiole 5–10 cm, 2.5–5 mm diam., terete or weakly flattened adaxially. Leaflets in up to 15 pairs, opposite or subopposite (proximally), (6–)10–42 by (2–)5– 14 cm, ovate to elliptic, papery to coriaceous, drying red-brown, glabrescent or hispid pubescent on the costae adaxially or, exceptionally, softly velutinous, bases asymmetric, acute, apices shortly cuspidate, costae 10–15 on each side, ascending, arcuate, ± prominent abaxially, tertiary venation prominulous; petiolules (4–)6–12 mm, glabrescent to tawny tomentose. Thyrses to 50 cm, axillary, supra-axillary or borne on short shoots (3–8 thyrses per shoot) on defoliated twigs, branches or bole (Borneo), 2–3-branched; branches to 10 cm long, ± pubescent; pedicels to 3(–4) mm; bracteoles 2 mm long, linear; pseudopedicel to 1 mm long. Calyx 1–3 mm deep, campanulate, puberulous without, margin ± entire. Petals (3) 4 (5), 12–20(–25) by 2.5 mm, spathulate, acute, pale yellow to white, reddish in sicco. Staminal tube c. 1 mm diam., ± glabrous without, ± pubescent within from just below anthers to base, margin 6–9-lobed, lobes to 2.5 mm long, entire to 2-or 3-fid; anthers 6–9, 1.5–2.2 mm long, elliptic-oblong, locellate, glabrous to villous. Disk to 0.5 mm tall, annular, glabrous. Ovary in female (? and hermaphrodite) flowers 3-or 4-locular, each locule with 1 (2) ovule(s); style pubescent in proximal 3/4; stylehead disciform to capitate. Infructescence to 30 cm, pendent. Capsule to 7 cm diam., globose to pyriform, occasionally weakly rostrate, orange-red, glabrous to velutinous; stipe to 1.5 cm long; pericarp usually with white latex. Seeds 3 or 4; testa blackish brown; aril circumhilar, margin crenate, sometimes with extension to micropyle, orange-red; cotyledons superposed. 2n = 46, 92.

Dense forests in ravines and on hills. Wet and very light conditions in secondary forests. Usually mixed with Aglaia gigantea, Albizia lucida, Caryodaphnopsis tonkinensis, Dalbergia balansae, and Pterocarpus tonkinensis.

UsesThe wood of Indian specimens has been considered by the timber industry. In New Guinea used as a fish poison.

Can be grown by seedlings.