Ochna pulchra Hook.

Trees up to 10 m tall or shrubs, soboliferous, occasionally dwarfed; trunk with rough broken bark below, smooth above, grey, flaking to expose cream patches. Branches spreading, brittle, rough, grey, new growth pale fawn. Leaves semi-persistent, turning yellow in winter, shed in spring, young leaves appearing with flowers, oblong to elliptic, c. 10 cm long and c. 2 cm wide but variable in size, apex obtuse, apiculate, base rounded or somewhat attenuate, margin pale, entire in lower half, shallowly serrulate above, midrib and veins prominent, firm and glossy; stipules intrapetiolar, paired, subulate, up to 15 mm long, rarely narrowly spatulate at the apex, early deciduous. Flowers fragrant, in simple, pendulous, clustered, many-flowered racemes terminating short annual branchlets; pedicels c. 1 cm at anthesis, up to 1.8 cm in fruit, articulated above the base. Sepals broadly ovate, 8 mm long, green to yellow, enlarged, reflexed, pink or red and white-edged in fruit. Petals soft yellow, obovate-attenuate, 12 mm long, fugaceous. Stamens numerous (c. 50) with filaments 2 mm long; anthers 1 mm long, biporose. Carpels 8, attached centrally on inside of torus; styles fused below, free and recurved above; stigmas apical, tumid. Drupelets kidney-shaped, rounded, 12 mm long, black or mottled with cream.

A tropical plant. It grows in open bushland. It is often on sandy soil. It can grow in arid places. In Zimbabwe it grows between 1,000-1,560 m above sea level. It suits hardiness zones 9-10.

The green fruit are roasted and eaten but the seeds are poisonous. Ripe fruit are boiled in water to release fat which is edible. The seeds have been reported as being eaten in Zambia. The seeds are dried and boiled and the oil skimmed off.

Seeds germinate poorly. Young plants are hard to transplant. Fresh seed planted where they are to grow is the best. The roots are only shallow.