Elaeocarpus serratus L. (ELAEOCARPACEAE)
Common names
English: Ceylon olive.
Kannada: Beejada mara, Danda amba.
Tamil: Ularga karai.
Malayalam: Nalla Karra, Valiya Kara.
Description: Trees, 25-30 m tall, branchlets with persistent leaf scars. Leaves alternate, oblong, obovate or elliptic, 5-13 x 2.5 -6 cm, acute cuneate at base, acute, obtuse or shortly acuminate at apex, repand-serrate or crenate, coriaceous; petioles 2-6 cm long, with 2 leafy processes at apex. Flowers in 4-8 cm long, axillary, drooping racemes, creamy white, fragrant. Sepals 4-5, glandular. Petals 5, obovate, narrowed at base, laciniate, glabrous. Stamens 30 -35; anthers oblong, puberulous, bearded. Disc thick, glandular woolly. Ovary pilose, 2-3 loculed. The fruit is a drupe, typically oblong, obovoid, or ellipsoid in shape, measuring 2.5 to 3.5 cm in length, with a blunt tip, and having a greenish-yellow color. The seeds within are enclosed in oblong pyrenes, which are pointed at the tip and marked with small tubercles, usually containing 1 to 2 seeds.
Flowering: March – June
Fruiting: July – October
Distribution: India: Common in moist deciduous to semi-evergreen forests of Western Ghats at ca 1500 m. Maharashtra, Karnataka Tamil Nadu and Kerala; Sikkim. Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, China, Malaysia and Indonesia (Java).
Uses: The fruits which are subacrid are eaten and also pickled. Wood greyish white, soft and little used. It is suitable for linings, packing cases and matchboxes. Leaf antirheumatic, used as an antidote to poisoning; fruit used in dysentery and diarrhoea.