Lophopyxis maingayi Hook.F.

Vigorous woody vine or climbing shrub, 3-8(-30) m; stem up to 7 cm ø, bark whitish. Branches virgate, youngest parts longitudinally grooved, with elliptic lenticels in the grooves, pu-berulent. Leaves ovate to oblong, apex ± acuminate, acutish, base cuneate to obtuse, rarely rounded or subcordate, subequal, chartaceous to subcoriaceous, caducous-puberulous especially at the nerves beneath, the hairs persisting in the nerve axils as domatia, serrulate-crenulate or crenate, sometimes subentire, 8-18(-24) by 4-8 (-10) cm, nerves 1(-2) basal or slightly supra-basal, and 3-4 upper pairs, all arched and steeply ascending, veins and veinlets densely reticulate, slender but prominent on both faces; petiole c. 10 by 1 mm. Stipules small, knob-like. Axillary branchlets metamorphosed into strong woody tendrils coiled only at the end, often bearing a bud. Panicles loose, composed of a few axillary or terminal spike-like racemes, pendent, puberulous, 10-25 cm. Flowers solitary, or mostly crowded into glomerules, these spaced along the slender to filiform rachis. Pedicels very slender, up to 2 mm. Bract at the base of the inflorescences often metamorphosed into a weak flat completely coiled tendril. Sepals ovate, greenish white or yellowish, hairy on both sides, c. 1.5 mm. Petals ovate, thin, c. 1 mm. Disk yellowish. ♂ Flowers: filaments hairy, 2 mm; anthers subglobose, 0.5 mm; rudiment of ovary subglobose, shallowly 5-ribbed, hairy. ♀ Flowers: ovary ovoid, whitish-yellowish puberulent, 2 mm. Capsule obovoid-ellipsoid in outline, 5-winged, green, later dark brown, caducous-pubescent, 2.2-3(-3.5) by 1.3-1.8 cm; wings chartaceous, 5-8 mm wide, with irregularly crenulate margin; pedicel short, subtended by the non-accrescent calyx. Seed 1, subcylindrical, acuminate, lengthwise grooved, 12-15 by 5-6 mm.

Straggling climber in canopy or edge of primary lowland forest, both in well drained and in swampy riverine forest, in littoral forest and even sometimes in the mangrove, also in disturbed gully forest or forest regrowths, seaside scrub; scattered, though locally not too rare, from sea-level up to c. 300 m, often on alluvial soil.

Uses. The rather hard stem splits easily into pieces, and apparently for this reason is used in New Britain for tying thatch. RUMPHIUS under his ‘Sinapistrum’ says, that crumpled leaves give a strong smell of mustard, and are used to cure ulcers.