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Carapa.org - grandiflora
Carapa grandiflora Sprague
Ref. J. Linn. Soc., Bot. 37: 507. 1906.
(all photos from Nyungwe National Park, Rwanda © Pierre-Michel Forget unless mentioned).
Type
Uganda, W Ankole Forest, Dawe 351 (holotype: K!).
Tree and leaves
It is a tree between 15 m and 25 m tall, reaching 80cm in diameter. Its bole is generally short and fluted, adn it has low buttresses. The bark is thin, redish in slash. Branches are arching downwards, with large leaves up to 1 m in length, but generally 15—55 cm long, with petiole 6—20 x 0.2—0.5 cm, base swollen, generally with 2 nectaries and a rachis 10—38 cm long, glabrous. leaves have (3—) 4—6(7) pairs of leaflets, with petiolule 0.5—1 cm long and basal with leaflet pairs (3—) 7—15 x (2—) 3—8.5 cm, ultimate pairs up to (6—) 10—28 x (3—) 5—8 cm, glabrous beneath, broadly oblanceolate-oblong to elliptic. The apex is short, cuspidate to broadly acuminate, not mucronate, and the base is broadly to narrowly cuneate. Midrib are prominent beneath, glabrous, with 5—13 pairs of secondary veins, tertiary veins being dense and raised beneath.
Inflorescence and flowers
The inflorescence in located at the axils of the fully developped or reduced scale-like leaves, and can be up to 33cm long, erect, sparsely branched, lower most branches up to 4cm long.
The peduncle size is very variable, 1.5—12 cm long. Flowers are 5-merous, with a distinct pedicell 2—5 mm long, and glabrous. Calyx is greenish, glabrous, with lobes 1.5—2.5 mm long. Petals are 6—8.5 mm long x 3—6 mm, reddish in bud, half-green and half-red
dish at anthesis, glabrous, each having a median gland. Staminal tube are 3.5—6.5 mm long, with 10 lobes 0.8—1.9 mm long, straight to slightly reflexed. Anthers are 1—1.4 x 0.6—0.9 mm;, with antherodes 0.7—1 x 0.5—0.8 mm. Disk is 1—1.5 mm high x 2.8—4 mm, yellowish to orange. Ovary is 1.2—2 x 1.6—2.7 mm in carpellate flowers, 1—2 x 0.8—1.3 mm in staminate flowers; locules 2-ovulate; style 0.5—1 mm long in carpellate flowers, up to 3.5mm long in staminate flowers; stigma 1.7—2.7 mm in diameter.
Fruit and seeds
Fruit are 9—14 x 5—11 cm in size, spherical, green with red septal bands, turning brow, with 5 valves with a median rib, variously with or lacking warty excrescences andnectaries.
Seeds are 3—5.2 x 3.8—7.1 cm, 1—2 per valve, with their hilum 10—35 x 3.5—14 mm. Testa is shiny, dark brown and smooth.
Phenology
Distribution
In East Africa, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Western Tanzania, in montane forest, 1200—2500 m altitude.
Notes
C. grandiflora may be sympatric with a species with 4-ovulate locules. Some specimens from the distribution range of C. grandiflora have flowers with 4-ovules per loculus and they also have smaller seeds, close to those of the Central AfricanC. angustifolia. More collecting and in situ studies are needed to determine the taxonomic status of these specimens.
Ecology
Seeds are dispersed by Giant pouched rat Cricetomys kivunensis that scatterhoard seeds, allowing their transportation and seedling establishment away from parent trees. Many seeds are also hoarded in burrow by rodents.
Seedlings are dispersed around the parent, and at greater distances , supposedly due to dispersal by elephant in Mountain forest in the Albertine rift. Indeed, Carapa seeds has been found in Elephant dung in Cameroun, and Carapa spp. are likely dispersed by elephant in african forests where both occur.
References
Nyiramana, A., Mendoza, I., Kaplin, B. A. and Forget, P.-M. (2011), Evidence for Seed Dispersal by Rodents in Tropical Montane Forest in Africa. Biotropica, 43: 654–657. doi: 10.1111/j.1744-7429.2011.00810.x