10 Euclea natalensis Seeds - Natal Guarri, Natal Ebony - Indigenous Tree

Euclea natalensis Seeds

Common Names: Natal Guarri, Natal Ebony, Large-leaved Guarri; Natalghwarrie, Berggwarrie, Swartbasboom

Euclea is a group of flowering plants, belonging to family Ebenaceae, the ebony family, described as a genus by Linnaeus in 1774. It includes evergreen trees and shrubs, native to Africa, the Comoro Islands, and Arabia. Several species are used for timber, producing a hard, dark heartwood timber similar to ebony.

Euclea natalensis commonly known as Natal Guarri, Natal Ebony or Large-leaved Guarri in English and Natalghwarrie, Berggwarrie or Swartbasboom in English is an adaptable, easy-to-grow tree with a neat, dense, rounded crown of dark green foliage, decorative pale, gold-tinged new growth, and makes a useful screening plant or handsome shade tree. Euclea natalensis is a shrub or small bushy tree, 4–10 m tall, with a dense, spreading crown, or under warm and well-watered conditions, a medium-sized tree 12–18 m tall with spreading branches. It has a spread of 510 m. The trunk is usually straight. The bark is dark grey, thin and finely cracked. Branchlets are covered in fine rusty hairs, becoming smooth with age. The leaves are hard and leathery, dark green and shiny above and paler underneath. The lower surface is often covered with thick, velvety red hairs, the upper surface is occasionally also covered with hairs. The leaves are variable in size, shape and hairiness, most often oval to oblong with pointed, bluntly pointed or rounded tips. The veins are prominent, particularly on the upper surface. The margins are thickened and often wavy. The new growth in spring is very decorative with pale, gold-tinged, velvety hairy foliage emerging out of the dark green crown. Euclea natalensis is dioecious (with male and female flowers borne on separate trees). The flowers are small, bell-shaped, cream to yellow and are carried in many-flowered, branched sprays in the axils of the leaves. They have a heavy, sweet scent. The male flowers contain usually 16 stamens and a minute rudimentary ovary with 2 styles. The female flowers have no staminodes. The fruits are rounded, fleshy berries, 70–130 mm in diameter, borne on hairy stalks. They are smooth or bristly, yellow, orange, red and black, in dense, conspicuous clusters. They are edible and attract birds. The trees flower in winter–spring (June–October) and fruit during summer (August–March), ripening in autumn. Euclea natalensis twigs are used for toothbrushes. The roots and/or bark are used as an ingredient in a variety of traditional remedies, to treat worms, stomach disorders, toothache, headache, chest complaints and pleurisy, urinary tract infections, venereal diseases, schistosomiasis, dysmenorrhoea and for scrofulous swellings, abnormal growths on skin and leprosy. It is also used for protective sprinkling charms. Roots are pounded and boiled and used to make a black dye. The wood is heavy, hard and strong, but is not much used and is avoided as firewood in KwaZulu-Natal.

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