Dysoxylum mollissimum Blume

Tree to 34 m (–58 m teste Koorders & Valeton, l.c.) with clear bole to 25 m and 150 cm diam., fluted, buttresses to 2 m (–5 m, Koorders, 1913) tall, 1 m out, concave. Bark grey-brown with elongated brown lenticels, becoming pustular and cracking vertically or scaling; inner bark yellow-brown, flecked orange; sapwood pale brown, often with strong smell of garlic, onions, potatoes or turnips; heartwood hard, deep red. Crown rather irregular with terminal rosettes of leaves. Twigs ascending, cicatrose, brown or reddish, often conspicuously lenticellate; leafy twigs to c. 1 cm diam., ± lenticellate, glaucous to reddish, subglabrous to densely yellow pubescent. Apical buds with fistshaped young leaves. Leaves 25–95 cm, imparipinnate, up to 14(–17)-jugate, the distal leaflets developing ± some time after the more proximal; petiole 5–10 cm, 3–4 mm diam., subglabrous to softly pubescent, often lenticellate, somewhat flattened adaxially or ± terete, base weakly swollen to clasping; rachis c. 3 mm diam., glabrescent to ± pubescent. Leaflets opposite to subopposite, c. 13–16 by 4–5 cm, the most proximal smaller, c. 6.5 by 3.5 cm, the apical often and the most distal laterals sometimes falling before developing, oblong to ovate, glabrous to sparsely pubescent, especially on veins adaxially, subglabrous to densely soft pubescent abaxially, rarely with domatia, base symmetric to asymmetric, obtuse to subcordate distally, acute to cuneate proximally, apex apiculate to acute; costae c. 10–12 on each side, prominent abaxially, obtuse, mostly ± bifid 2/3 from midrib and anastomosing; petiolules 2–7 mm. Thyrses to 60 cm, axillary to supra-axillary, pendent, 1-or 2-branched, the primary to 12 cm, the more distal shorter, the secondary to c. 1 cm bearing sweetly scented multiflowered fascicles; bracts and bracteoles 2 or 3, c. 1 mm long, triangular, ± densely pubescent; pedicels 0–1 mm. Calyx c. 1 mm long, 1.5 mm diam., salveriform to shallowly cupular, ± densely adpressed pubescent, 4-lobed, the lobes irregularly triangular. Petals 4 (or 5), 8–12 mm long, linear, cream, ± sparsely pubescent without, ± imbricate at apices, adnate to staminal tube in proximal half. Staminal tube hairy on both sides, especially villous within, weakly ribbed, the margin subtruncate to 8-lobed, the lobes ± emarginate; anthers 8, c. 0.5 mm long, oblong, weakly locellate, glabrous, included. Disk 2–4 mm long, cylindrical, glabrous to pubescent, green, margin irregularly 4-toothed. Ovary ± sericeous 4-locular, each locule 1-ovulate; style terete, sericeous to villous in proximal half; stylehead subdiscoid to short-cylindrical. Capsule 15–25 mm diam., flattened globose, glabrous, 4-valved, red-brown, smooth or pustular-lenticellate; pericarp with white latex. Seeds 1–4, to 16 mm long, plano-convex, with red aril; cotyledons collateral, with white latex.

A sub-canopy to canopy tree in subtropical, tropical and littoral rainforests. Well developed rain forest on a variety of sites, but more common in lowland and upland rain forests; at elevations up to 800 metres in Australia.

UsesAccording to Harms (1940), this species is one of the biggest trees of Java but Backer & Bakhuizen f. (l.c.) record that it has not been collected in West Java since before the 1860s. Its wood has been used sporadically for houseposts and other construction and it is recorded as an important commercial lumber tree from which boards are made in Hainan. Subsp. molle is the red bean, kedgy-kedgy or pencil cedar of tropical Australia used in cabinet work. In Fiji, the fruits are used in the treatment of wounds; the constitution of the efficacious essential oil has been determined by Aalbersberg & Singh [ Aalbersberg & Singh Flav. & Frag. J. 6 1991 125 ].

Can be grown by seedlings.