Choerospondias axillaris

Choerospondias axillaris
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
(unranked): Angiosperms
(unranked): Eudicots
(unranked): Rosids
Order: Sapindales
Family: Anacardiaceae
Genus: Choerospondias
Species: C. axillaris
Binomial name
Choerospondias axillaris
(Roxb.) B.L.Burtt & A.W.Hill

Choerospondias axillaris, known as Lapsi लप्सी in Nepali and Aamali आम्ली in Nepal Bhasa , also known in English as the "Nepali hog plum", and nánsuānzǎo in Mandarin (Chinese: 南酸枣; literally: "southern sour date"), is a tree in the family Anacardiaceae. It is known as Lepchipoma in Assamese and in Bengal it is known as Amrda."আমড়া" It is native to much of Asia from India to China to Japan. Its fruit is about 3 centimeters long and has a soft whitish sour flesh and green to yellow skin. The fruit is made into pickles, fruit tarts, and sour, spicy candy in Nepal. The tree has long been cultivated in rural Nepal for its fruit.[1] The fruit is nutritious and has a price comparable to the mandarin orange on the Nepalese market.[1]

This is a deciduous tree growing up to 20 meters tall. The smaller branches are purple-brown in color. The compound leaves are up to 40 cm (16 in) long and divided into 3 to 6 papery oval leaflets each up to 12 cm × 4.5 cm (4.7 in × 1.8 in).[2] The tree is dioecious, with male and female trees producing different types of inflorescence.[1] Male flowers occur in long clusters and have curving, brown-veined petals about 3 millimeters long. Female flowers are solitary in leaf axils at the tips of branches. They are larger than the male flowers and yield the edible drupe. The fallen fruits are consumed and dispersed by sambar and barking deer.[3][4]

Besides fruit, the tree yields valuable wood and hard seeds which are burned for fuel, and has parts used medicinally in Vietnam.[1]

Catechin-7-O-glucoside can be found in the stem barks of C. axillaris.[5]

Gallery

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Poudel, K. C. (2003). "Domestication of Lapsi Choerospondias axillaris (Roxb.) B.L. Burtt & A.W. Hill for fruit production in the middle mountain agroforestry systems of Nepal". Himalayan Journal of Sciences. 1 (1): 55–58.
  2. Tianlu Min; Anders Barfod. "Choerospondias axillaris". Flora of China. Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, MO & Harvard University Herbaria, Cambridge, MA. Retrieved 2 March 2013.
  3. Brodie JF; OE Helmy; WY Brockelman; JL Maron (2009). "Functional differences within a guild of tropical mammalian frugivores" (PDF). Ecology. 90 (3): 688–698. doi:10.1890/08-0111.1.
  4. Chen, J., Deng, X.B., Bai, Z.L., Yang, Q., Chen, G.Q., Liu, Y. and Liu, Z.Q. (2002). "Fruit characteristics and Muntiacus muntjac vaginalis (Muntjac) visits to individual plants of Choerospondias axillaris". Biotropica. 33: 718–722. doi:10.1111/j.1744-7429.2001.tb00231.x.
  5. Flavanoidal constituents of Choerospondias axillaries and their in vitro antitumor and anti-hypoxia activities. Li Chang-wei, Cui Cheng-bin, Cai Bing, Han Bing, Li Ming-ming and Fan Ming, Chinese Journal Of Medicinal Chemistry, 2009, 19 (1), pages 48-51,64 (abstract)

This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Wood, James, ed. (1907). "article name needed". The Nuttall Encyclopædia. London and New York: Frederick Warne. 


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