Ziziphus mauritiana Lam. var. deserticola A. Chev.

"

Flower

In axillary cymes; cream. Flowering from July-November.

Fruit

An oblong-globose drupe, rugose, orange when ripe. Fruiting from October-December.

Field tips

Bark dark grey, with irregular cracks. Branches drooping. Leaves rounded, 3-nerved from base, shiny above and white fulvous-tawny beneath.

Leaf Arrangement

Alternate-distichous

Leaf Type

Simple

Leaf Shape

Orbicular

Leaf Apex

Rounded-retuse

Leaf Base

Oblique

Leaf Margin

Denticulate

"

Trees or shrubs, evergreen, to 15 m tall. Young branches densely yellow-gray tomentose; branchlets pilose; old branches purple-red. Stipular spines 2, one oblique and hooklike recurved; petiole 5-13 mm, densely gray-yellow tomentose; leaf blade adaxially dark green, shiny, ovate or oblong-elliptic, rarely subrounded, 2.5-6 × 1.5-4.5 cm, papery to thickly papery, abaxially yellow or gray-white tomentose, adaxially glabrous, 3-veined from base, veins conspicuously reticulate abaxially, impressed or ± prominent adaxially, base subrounded, slightly oblique, margin serrulate, apex rounded, rarely acute. Flowers green-yellow, few to 10 in subsessile or shortly pedunculate, axillary dichotomous cymes. Pedicel 2-4 mm, gray-yellow tomentose. Sepals ovate-triangular, abaxially hairy, apex acute. Petals oblong-spatulate, clawed at base. Stamens subequaling petals. Disk thick, fleshy, 10-lobed, concave at middle. Ovary globose, glabrous; style 2-fid or branched to half. Drupe orange or red, turning black at maturity, oblong or globose, 1-1.2 cm, ca. l cm in diam., with persistent tube at base; fruiting pedicel 5-8 mm, pilose, 2-loculed, 1- or 2-seeded; mesocarp corky; endocarp thick, thickly leathery. Seeds red-brown, broad and compressed, 6-7 × 5-6 mm, shiny. Fl. Aug-Nov, fr. Sep-Dec. 2n = 24.

Tree, 9-15 m or large shrub, branches spreading and drooping, young branches softly tomentose, longer stipular spine, c. 5-7 mm long, sometime without spines. Leaves ovate, oblong, elliptic-ovate, or sub-orbicular, 2-9 cm x 1.5-5 cm, slightly oblique at base, obtuse, rounded shortly acuminate at apex, rounded or sub-cordate or entire, serrate, glabrous and dark green above, greyish pale-coloured and densely tomentose beneath; petiole 8-15 mm long, tomentose. Inflorescence axillary cymes, tomentose. Flowers 2-3 mm across, greenish yellow. Calyx 5, hairy out-side, glabrous within, c. 1.5 mm long, ovate, acute, keeled within. Petals 5, spoon like or clawed, reflexed, c.1 mm long. Stamens 5, smaller than the petals. Ovary 2-celled, styles bifid. Disc 10-lobed or grooved; fruit 1.5-3.5 x 1.5-2.5 cm, globose to ovoid, bilocular; pyrene tubercled and irregularly furrowed.

The hard, fine wood is used in making furniture; the bark is used medicinally. The leaves contain tannin used for producing tannin extract. This is an important host tree for the parasitic scale insect, Laccifer lacca (lac insect).