''Trilepisium'', the urnfigs or false-figs, is a small

Afrotropical The Afrotropical realm is one of Earth's eight biogeographic realms. It includes Africa south of the Sahara Desert, the majority of the Arabian Peninsula, the island of Madagascar, southern Iran and extreme southwestern Pakistan, and the island ...

genus of

plant Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclud ...

s in family

Moraceae The Moraceae — often called the mulberry family or fig family — are a family of flowering plants comprising about 38 genera and over 1100 species. Most are widespread in tropical and subtropical regions, less so in temperate climates; however ...

. They grow to medium-sized or large trees that occur in evergreen and semi-deciduous forests, flooded forests or forest patches and often along rivers and streams, and at elevations of up to 2,000 m and over.

Description

The bole may be 60 cm wide, and is often fluted at the base. The smooth, grey bark is very

lenticellate A lenticel is a porous tissue consisting of cells with large intercellular spaces in the periderm of the secondarily thickened organs and the bark of woody stems and roots of dicotyledonous flowering plants. It functions as a pore, providing a p ...

and exudes a cream-coloured latex when damaged. The yellowish to pinkish slash turns purple-red as it dries. They usually branch high up to form a small and loosely pyramidal crown with drooping twigs. Stipules of terminal buds eventually leave annular scars. The glossy and very dark elliptic leaves have a prominent driptip, and measure up to 14 cm long. They are glossy below, and have two small lobes at the base. The flowers appear in spring and are arranged in a whitish to mauve puff. The puff is about 1 cm in diameter, and consists of

staminate The stamen (plural ''stamina'' or ''stamens'') is the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower. Collectively the stamens form the androecium., p. 10 Morphology and terminology A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filam ...

male flowers and

pistillate Gynoecium (; ) is most commonly used as a collective term for the parts of a flower that produce ovules and ultimately develop into the fruit and seeds. The gynoecium is the innermost whorl of a flower; it consists of (one or more) ''pistils'' ...

female flowers, without

perianth The perianth (perigonium, perigon or perigone in monocots) is the non-reproductive part of the flower, and structure that forms an envelope surrounding the sexual organs, consisting of the calyx (sepals) and the corolla (petals) or tepals when ...

s, which obscure the view of the receptacle. The flowers protrude from the open apex of an

urn An urn is a vase, often with a cover, with a typically narrowed neck above a rounded body and a footed pedestal. Describing a vessel as an "urn", as opposed to a vase or other terms, generally reflects its use rather than any particular shape or ...

-shaped receptacle which is about 1.5 cm long. The fig-like fruit, embedded in the fleshy receptacles, are some 2 cm long. They are ellipsoidal in shape and hold a nutlet each. Ripe fruit have the appearance of blue plums.

Species

The two species are distinguished on floral characteristics: * '' Trilepisium gymnandrum'' (Baker) J.Gerlach –

Silhouette Island Silhouette Island lies northwest of Mahé in the Seychelles. It is the third largest granitic island in the Seychelles. It has an area of 20.1 km2 and has a population of 200, mostly workers on the island. The main settlement is La Passe ...

, Seychelles * ''

Trilepisium madagascariense ''Trilepisium madagascariense'', the urnfig or false-fig, is a species of plant in the family Moraceae, with an extensive range in the subtropical and tropical Afrotropics. It grows to a medium-sized or large tree in primary or secondary forest, ...

'' DC. –

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

n mainland,

Madagascar Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa ...

and

Annobón Annobón ( es, Provincia de Annobón; pt, Ano-Bom), and formerly as ''Anno Bom'' and ''Annabona'', is a province (smallest province in both area and population) of Equatorial Guinea consisting of the island of Annobón, formerly also Pigalu a ...

island

Uses and species associations

The wood of ''T. madagascariense'' is suitable for furniture, and the sap yields a red dye. Its roasted seeds are eaten and it is sometimes cultivated. A methanol extract, fractions and isoliquiritigenin from ''T. madagascariense'' stem bark has been shown to possess antidiarrheal activities, and previously unknown trilepisflavan and trilepisuimic acid compounds were isolated from it in 2012. ''Trilepisium madagascariense'' is a larval foodplant for the butterfly '' Cyrestis camillus sublineata''. On the Seychelles the seeds are likely dispersed by frugivorous birds and fruit bats, but the pollinators are unknown.

References

{{Moraceae genera Moraceae genera Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Afrotropical realm flora Taxa named by Louis-Marie Aubert du Petit-Thouars