Saraca celebica


Saraca celebica, commonly known locally as Sejenis Ashoka, in is a species of plant in the family Fabaceae. It is a tree found only in Sulawesi in Indonesia.

Description

Saraca celebica is a tree which grows up to in height. Leaves are 3-4 rows of jugate leaflets, growing long, with a short petiole, measuring long and with a rachis long, blackish-brown when dry. Leaflets are subcoriaceous and glabrous, elliptic-oblong to oblong-lanceolate, and rarely ovate, measuring long by wide with petioles. Leaflets above are usually not larger than the lower ones and leaf bases are often accompanied by small marginal glands.
Flowers are orange-red and fragrant. Corymbes are erect, compact, about wide, glabrous, with branches up to thick. Bracts and bracteoles are caducous, subequal in size and shape, fusiform, ovate or obovate, with an obtuse or acute tips, growing about long and wide. Calyxes are, rarely, long, thick. Pedicels are long for the section between the calyx tube and bracteoles. Calyx lobes are oval or oblong, long by wide, with an obtuse apex. Stamens amount to 4, rarely 6. Stamens have filaments growing long and anthers measuring about. Ovary stems are long, with ovaries being long. Styles are long.
The fruits are pods, numbering 1-6 per corymb, woody, oblong to oblong-lanceolate, measuring about, being up to about thick; the base is obliquely cuneate and the top is acute-acuminate, beaked, 5-6 seeded. Dry mature valves are somewhat coiled, about thick, with the inside containing traces of seed compartments. Immature pods are flat with somewhat thickened margins. Mature seeds are suborbicular, more or less depressed at the side of the hilum, about, hard, with a rounded edge, and a glossy dark brown surface. The hilum itself is small, about.

Taxonomy

Saraca celibata was identified and described by Willem Jan Jacobus Oswald de Wilde in the Dutch journal of botany Blumea in 1967. A description of the fruits was missing from the original description, this was included in a 1981 Blumea article describing the then newly identified S. monadelpha.

Etymology

Celibata refers to Celebes, the name given to the island of Sulawesi by Portuguese explorers, to which it is endemic. A direct translation of Celebes is unclear, but it might be considered a Portuguese rendering of the native name "Sulawesi".

Distribution and habitat

The trees were observed in central and east Sulawesi and were common along the Larona River, flowing from Lake Towuti. They grow along streams at a low altitude up to about.

Ecology

S. saraca was observed to flower abundantly in June; collections of flowers were made in September and October. Mature seeds appeared to be rare in herbarium collections.