Dipterocarpus palembanicus (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Dipterocarpus palembanicus v. Slooten

Protologue: Bull. Jard. Bot. Buitenzorg, sér. 3, 8: 336, f. 12 (1927).

Vernacular names

• Brunei: keruing ternek
• Indonesia: lagan daun halus (southern Sumatra), lagan torop (northern Sumatra)
• Malaysia: keruing ternek (Peninsular, Sarawak), keruing palembang (Sabah).

Distribution

Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo.

Uses

The timber is used as keruing. The bole is tapped for oil in Peninsular Malaysia.

Observations

• A medium-sized to large tree of up to 50 m tall, bole straight, cylindrical, up to 120 cm in diameter, buttresses up to 1.5 m tall, bark surface orange-red, outer bark brown, thin, inner bark ochre, sapwood ochre; buds shortly oblong to conical, fulvous hirsute.
• Leaves broadly elliptical to ovate (subsp. palembanicus) or oblong to ovate (subsp. borneensis P. Ashton), 10-14 cm × 5-9 cm (subsp. palembanicus) or 7-11 cm × 3-6 cm (subsp. borneensis), base obtuse or cuneate, acumen short or up to 2 cm long, secondary veins 12-14 pairs, beneath densely shortly puberulent, petiole 1.5-3 cm long, stipules narrowly hastate, acute, outside densely fulvous hirsute.
• Stamens 15.
• Fruit calyx tube narrowly ellipsoid, glabrous, broadly 5-winged, 2 larger fruit calyx lobes up to 10 cm × 3.5 cm, 3 shorter ones to 5 mm × 10 mm.

D. palembanicus occurs locally on clay soils in mixed dipterocarp forest on hills up to 650 m altitude. The density of the wood is 595-785 kg/m³ at 15% moisture content.

Selected sources

30, 31, 140, 183, 258, 476, 677, 748, 799.

Main genus page

• Dipterocarpus (Timbers)

Authors

• T. Smitinand (selection of species),
• C. Phengklai (selection of species),
• L.E. Groen (selection of species)