Ficus nodosa (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Ficus nodosa Teijsm. & Binnend.

Protologue: Natuurk. Tijdschr. Ned. Ind. 29: 245 (1867).

Family: Moraceae

Synonyms

• Ficus du K. Schumann & Lauterb. (1900).

Vernacular names

• Indonesia: laura (Moluccas), manseke (Irian Jaya).
• Papua New Guinea: jaron, paka, kemkem (New Ireland).

Distribution

Indonesia (the Moluccas, Irian Jaya), Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and south to northern Australia (Queensland).

Uses

Young leaves are eaten cooked as a vegetable. Fruits are edible. In New Britain, the leaves are applied externally as a styptic and antiseptic. The fibrous bark is used to make strings and clothing.

Observations

• A medium-sized, buttressed tree up to 30 m tall, bark surface grey to reddish-brown, inner bark fibrous.
• Leaves alternate, broadly ovate, 15-37 cm × 10-30 cm, base rounded to cordate, apex obtuse to acuminate, entire or slightly toothed, margin sinuate, with 5-7 pairs of veins, glabrous, stipules silky; petiole 5-20 cm long.
• Fig ssolitary on twigs and in thick clusters on the trunk and large branches, subglobose to subpyriform, 25-40 mm in diameter, densely lenticellate, ripening yellow to purple-brown; flowers with 3-4 laciniate-dentate tepals fused at base, male flowers in 3 rows, sessile, female flowers sessile or shortly stipitate.

F. nodosa is found in lowland forest, up to 900 m altitude.

Selected sources

vegetables and medicinals references merged

• Boer, E. & Sosef, M.S.M., 1998. Ficus L. In: Sosef, M.S.M., Hong, L.T. & Prawirohatmodjo, S. (Editors): Plant Resources of South-East Asia No 5(3). Timber trees: Lesser-known timbers. Backhuys Publishers, Leiden, the Netherlands. pp. 232-23
• Chew, W.-L., 1989. Moraceae. In: George, A.S. (Editor): Flora of Australia. Vol. 3. Hamamelidales to Casuarinales. Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra, Australia. pp. 15-68.
• Corner, E.J.H., 1965. Checklist of Ficus in Asia and Australasia with keys to identification. The Gardens' Bulletin Singapore 21(1): 1–186.
• Diels, L., 1935. Die Moraceen von Papuasien [The Moraceae of Papuasia]. Botanische Jahrbücher 67: 171–235.
• Henderson, C.P. & Hancock, I.R., 1988. A guide to the useful plants of Solomon Islands. Ministry of Agriculture and Lands, Honaira, Solomon Islands. 481 pp.
• Holdsworth, D.K., 1977. Medicinal plants of Papua New Guinea. Technical Paper No 175. South Pacific Commission, Noumea, New Caledonia. 123 pp.
• Paijmans, K. (Editor), 1976. New Guinea vegetation. Elsevier Scientific Publishing Company, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. 209 pp.
• Peekel, P.G., 1984. Flora of the Bismarck Archipelago for naturalists. English edition. Office of Forests, Division of Botany, Lae, Papua New Guinea. 638 pp.

Main genus page

• Ficus (Medicinal plants)

Authors

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