Anisoptera thurifera (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Anisoptera thurifera (Blanco) Blume

Protologue: Mus. Bot. Lugd.-Bat. 2: 42 (1852).

Vernacular names

• Indonesia: baoti (Sulawesi), bolam (Morotai, Moluccas), aren marei (Irian Jaya)
• Papua New Guinea: garawa, barida, karalaka
• Philippines: palosapis (general), mayapis (Sambali, Tagalog), dagang (Tagalog, Bikol, Panay Bisaya).

Distribution

The Philippines, New Guinea, and possibly Sulawesi and the Moluccas.

Uses

The wood is suitable for interior finish, floors, furniture, ship planking, general construction, wooden tanks, tight cooperage, and veneer and plywood. Wood extractives are reported to have a tumour-inhibiting capacity. In the Philippines the resin is collected locally but not on a commercial scale. The gum is used as a chewing gum in some areas of Papua New Guinea. The nuts are eaten (after cooking), and have a high content of edible oils.

Observations

• A medium-sized to very large tree up to 60 m tall, bole branchless for up to 25 m, up to 200 cm in diameter and prominently buttressed.
• Leaves 6-18 cm × 2.5-8.5 cm, elliptical to lanceolate or oblanceolate or obovate, greyish to brown lepidote beneath, with (10-)12-18(-20) pairs of secondary veins.
• Flower bud lanceolate, stamens 35-57, stylopodium narrowly ellipsoid-cylindrical, the apex puberulent.

A. thurifera is extremely variable and is divided into 2 subspecies: subsp. thurifera (synonym: A. brunnea Foxw.) from the Philippines and subsp. polyandra (Blume) P. Ashton (synonyms: A. polyandra Blume, A. kostermansiana Dilmy) from Papua New Guinea and possibly also Sulawesi and the Moluccas. A. thurifera grows in evergreen and semi-evergreen dipterocarp forest especially on ridges, below 750 m altitude (subsp. thurifera) or scattered or in small groups in lowland forest on flat and undulating land or ridges up to 600(-1000) m altitude, especially on sedimentary rocks (subsp. polyandra). It is the only dipterocarp which readily reinvades cultivated land. The density of the wood is 580-710 kg/m³ (subsp. thurifera) and 500-850 kg/m³ (subsp. polyandra) at 15% moisture content. See also the table on wood properties.

Selected sources

67, 175, 203, 248, 258, 347, 348, 359, 579, 674, 713, 735, 736, 815.

Main genus page

• Anisoptera

Authors

• M.H.A. Hoffman (selection of species)