Ficus callophylla (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Ficus callophylla Blume

Family: Moraceae

Synonyms

Ficus pachyphylla Merr.

Vernacular names

• Philippines: balete (Tagalog), lunug (Panay Bisaya), pasakla (Ilokano)
• Thailand: sai (Trat).

Distribution

Thailand, Indo-China, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Hongkong.

Uses

The bast fibres are made into durable and fairly strong rope.

Observations

A strangling, monoecious tree, epiphytic when young, 20-40 m tall. Leaves subopposite; stipules lanceolate, 2.5-3 cm long; petiole 24.5 cm long; blade elliptical, 6.5-20 cm × 3-10 cm, base cuneate or obtuse, apex broadly rounded, smooth, with 8-10 pairs of lateral veins. Fruit a syconium, 1.2-1.5 cm × 11.5 cm, occurring in pairs, pale yellow with pink and red dots and lines, with persistent basal bracts. In the Philippines F. callophylla is a widely distributed forest species at low altitudes. In Philippine studies in the 1910s, dry and wet rope made from the bast of F. callophylla had a tensile strength of 464 kg per cm² and 544 kg per cm², respectively, and an elongation at break of 12% and 17%, respectively.

Selected sources

6, 19, 28, 93, 160, 194.

Authors

M. Brink, P.C.M. Jansen & C.H. Bosch