''Hippobromus pauciflorus'' ( Afrikaans: Baster-perdepis = False horse urine), commonly known as false horsewood, is a small South African semi-deciduous tree occurring on the margins of forest, stream banks and in scrub forest. Frequently growing as a tall, slender sapling and accordingly prized as wattle for hut-building. Leaves 75 mm to 150 mm long, paripinnate with some 5 pairs of leaflets which are extremely variable in shape, wedge-shaped at the base, entire, dentate or deeply lobed, sessile and winged on the rachis between leaflets.

Panicles A panicle is a much-branched inflorescence. (softcover ). Some authors distinguish it from a compound spike inflorescence, by requiring that the flowers (and fruit) be pedicellate (having a single stem per flower). The branches of a panicle are ...

up to 75 mm long and many-flowered. Fruits are about 8 mm in diameter, black, pulpy and unpalatable. All parts of the tree have an unpleasant odour when bruised. Fourcade describes the wood as "very heavy and hard, very strong, moderately elastic, close-grained ... heartwood brown, sapwood white, tinged with brown, used for wagon-work and other purposes. The wood and leaves contain a strongly scented resinous and oily substance, which renders them readily inflammable." This tree is found along the east coast from the

Eastern Cape The Eastern Cape is one of the provinces of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, but its two largest cities are East London and Gqeberha. The second largest province in the country (at 168,966 km2) after Northern Cape, it was formed in ...

, through KwaZulu Natal,

Eswatini Eswatini ( ; ss, eSwatini ), officially the Kingdom of Eswatini and formerly named Swaziland ( ; officially renamed in 2018), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered by Mozambique to its northeast and South Africa to its no ...

and further inland through the Transvaal up to the Soutpansberg. It is one of the few trees on which the larva of the Swallow-tail butterfly (''

Papilio demoleus ''Papilio demoleus'' is a common and widespread swallowtail butterfly. The butterfly is also known as the lime butterfly, lemon butterfly, lime swallowtail, and chequered swallowtail. These common names refer to their host plants, which are usu ...

'') will feed other than species of citrus belonging to Rutaceae. The name 'Hippobromus' is Greek for 'smelling of horse urine', which it closely resembles. The specific name is Latin for 'few-flowered'. It belongs to the family

Sapindaceae The Sapindaceae are a family of flowering plants in the order Sapindales known as the soapberry family. It contains 138 genera and 1858 accepted species. Examples include horse chestnut, maples, ackee and lychee. The Sapindaceae occur in tempera ...

, closely related to Rutaceae, together with over 100 other genera such as ''

Sapindus ''Sapindus'' is a genus of about five to twelve species of shrubs and small trees in the lychee family, Sapindaceae, native to warm temperate to tropical regions of the world. The genus includes both deciduous and evergreen species. Members of ...

'', '' Litchi'', '' Koelreuteria'', ''

Dodonaea ''Dodonaea'' is a genus of about 70 species of flowering plants, often known as hop-bushes, in the soapberry family, Sapindaceae. It has a cosmopolitan distribution in tropical, subtropical and warm temperate regions of Africa, the Americas, s ...

'' and ''

Blighia ''Blighia'' is a genus of four species of flowering plants in the soapberry family, Sapindaceae, native to tropical Africa from Guinea east to Kenya. The fruit is partly edible, with the Ackee (''B. sapida'') being grown commercially for fruit p ...

''.

References

* The Forests and Forest Flora of the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope by

Thomas Robertson Sim Thomas Robertson Sim (25 June 1858 in Northfield, Aberdeenshire, Scotland – 23 July 1938 in Durban, Natal) was a botanist, bryologist, botanical artist and Conservator of Forests in Natal, best known for his monumental work '' The Forests ...

(1907)

External links

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15302930 Sapindaceae