Ficus baeuerleni (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Ficus baeuerleni King

Protologue: Journ. Asiat. Soc. Bengal II, 55: 408 (1887).

Synonyms

• Ficus mespiloides King (1888),
• Ficus hollrungii Lauterb. & K. Schumann (1901),
• Ficus laurentina Diels (1935).

Distribution

New Guinea, New Britain and the Solomon Islands.

Uses

In Papua New Guinea, the latex of the inner bark is drunk to treat diarrhoea or dysentery.

Observations

• A large climber, stem red when cut, bark thick, corky.
• Leaves elliptical, 10-25 cm × 4.5-10.5 cm, base subcordate to broadly cuneate, apex acuminate, margin entire, with 5-9 pairs of lateral veins, hairy on the veins below, stipules up to 12 mm long.
• Figs axillary, solitary or paired, depressed globose, 23-30 mm in diameter, lanuginose, ripening rose-red.

F. baeuerleni occurs in lowland forest.

Selected sources

• [281] Corner, E.J.H., 1965. Check-list of Ficus in Asia and Australia. Gardens' Bulletin, Singapore 21: 1-186.
• [609] Holdsworth, D.K. & Mahana, P., 1983. Traditional medicinal plants of the Huon Peninsula, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. International Journal of Crude Drug Research 21: 121-133.

Main genus page

• Ficus (Medicinal plants)

Authors

• J.P. Rojo, F.C. Pitargue & M.S.M. Sosef