Gmelina arborea Roxb. (VERBENACEAE)
Common names
Sanskrit: Gumbhari, Kaashmariya
Kannada: Shivani Gumadi, Kumalamaram.
Malayalam: Kumbil.
Telugu: Gummadi, Gumar tek.
Description: Deciduous trees, ranging from 10 to 20 meters in height, feature greyish-yellow bark, with branchlets and young parts covered in a fine white mealy pubescence. Leaves opposite, broadly ovate, 10-22 x 7-15 cm, subcordate or truncate at base, acuminate at apex, glabrous above when mature, stellately fulvous – tomentose beneath; petioles 5-8 cm long. Flowers in 10-25 cm long axillary or terminal paniculate cymes, brownish-yellow. Calyx companulate, tomentose without, lobes 5. Corolla, densely hairy outside, lobes 5, brownish-yellow. Stamens 4, didynamous, inserted; filaments long. Ovary 4-locular; style long; stigma subulate. Fruit a drupe, obovate, ovoid or pyriform, ca 2.5 cm long, smooth, orange-yellow when ripe. Seeds oblong
Flowering & Fruiting: January – May.
Distribution: India: Throughout in the deciduous forests and hills, up to 1700 m. Sri Lanka, Malaya and Philippine Islands Wood yellowish to reddish white when first exposed, aging to light russet or yellowish brown, light to moderately heavy, hard, strong, elastic, lustrous with a smooth feel, durable in contact with water. One of the best and most reliable timber of India, used for furniture, planking, venetian-blinds, light cooperage, carriages, printing blocks, carving, musical instruments, shafts, axles, lacquered boxes, picture-frames, artificial limbs, jute bobbins, loom parts, calipers, mine props, etc. It is also employed for bridges, well work and ship building. The wood is suitable for tea-chest plywood, paper making, match sticks and matchboxes. Leaves good fodder for cattle. Plant antidote for snakebite and scorpion sting; root galactogogue, demulcent, tonic, stomachic, laxative, antibilious, used in anasarca; bark used in headache; root and bark febrifuge; leaf demulcent, bechic, used in gonorrhoea and for removing fetid discharges and worms from ulcers; fruit enters into cooling decoctions, used in fevers and bilious affections. Leaf is an ingredient of “Dasamula”.
