Elaeocarpus munroii

IUCN Red List Status: Near Threatened and Lower Risk/Near Threatened (NT)

Elaeocarpus munroii (Wight) Masters in Fl. Brit. India 1: 407. 1874. (syn: Monocera munroii Wight);

Kannada	Nari Bikki, Kal Bikki
Malayalam	Pungari, Shirukodala, Punkara, Kalrudraksham, Pungeri
Others	Milachiriyan, Naribikki
Tamil	Rudraksham

Trees, to 20 m high, bark dark grey, smooth; branchlets sympodial, slender. Leaves simple, alternate, clustered to the tip of branchlets; stipules free, lateral, cauducous; petiole 25-50 mm, very slender, glabrous, slightly swollen at tip and base; lamina 4-10 x 1.7-5 cm, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, base round or obtuse, apex acuminate or caudate-acuminate, margin crenate or serrate, revolute, glabrous, chartaceous, nerve axils glandular beneath; lateral nerves 3-6 pairs, pinnate, prominent, intercostae reticulate, slender, prominent. Flowers bisexual, white, in short drooping axillary racemes; sepals 5, 8 mm long, lanceolate, thinly tomentose; petals 5, white with reddish lines at base, ovate-lanceolate, laciniate, densely silky on both sides, inserted round the base of glandular disc; stamens numerous, inserted between the glands on the disc; anthers awned with long bristle; ovary densely superior, silky hairy, placed on the torus, 2-celled, ovules 2 in each cell; style subulate, entire. Fruit a drupe, blue, oblong, terete, glabrous, glaucous; stone 1-2 seeded.

Flowering and fruiting: September-April

Evergreen and shola forests

Southern Western Ghats

(From India Biodiversity Portal

Attributions- Dr. N Sasidharan (Dr. B P Pal Fellow), Kerala Forest Research Institute, Peechi )

Occurs over a wide range at the southern end of the Western Ghats.

Evergreen and shola forest between 600 and 2,000 m.

(From IUCN Red List (NT) )