Abutilon austro-africanum
Click on each image to see a larger version and details of the record
Image 1
Flower and leaves
27 Apr 2008
Image 2
Flower and leaves
27 Apr 2008
Image 3
Dried fruit
27 Apr 2008
| Family: | Malvaceae |
| Full name: | Abutilon austro-africanum Hochr. |
| ID status: | Fairly certain |
| Afrikaans common name(s): | - |
| English common name(s): | Indian mallow |
| Synonym(s): | - |
| Status: | Native |
| Description: | Shrublet 0.5-0.75 m tall, often spreading, canescent to glaucous with a short greyish velvety indumentum and additional long soft patent white hairs (rarely very sparse or almost lacking); stems greyish- or yellowish-green when young, soon glabrescent and becoming pale-purplish-brown, ultimately woody with an ash-grey smooth or finely longitudinally fissured bark. Leaf-lamina 2-5 (8) x 1-3 (5) cm, cordate-triangular to ovate-cordate, apex acute or somewhat acuminate or rounded, margin crenate to crenate-serrate often with minutely callous-mucronate serrations, dark-greyish-green and velvety above, much paler, glaucous-grey and finely velvety beneath, venation of lower surface somewhat prominent and conspicuous owing to its whitish or pale yellow colour; petiole usually shorter than the lamina, terete. Flowers yellow, solitary, axillary on main branches (not on condensed short axillary shoots); pedicels (10) 25-50 mm long, slender, terete, articulated near the apex. Calyx 9-12 mm long, widely campanulate, incised beyond the middle; lobes 6-8 mm long, triangular-ovate to ovate-lanceolate, acuminate-apiculate, with a prominent median vein and usually in addition with a faint longitudinal vein on either side. Petals 11-14 x 8 mm, conspicuously ciliate in basal narrowed portion, often marked with reddish spots at the base and reddish-veined in lower portion. Staminal tube rather shortly conical, sparsely stellate-hairy to glabrous except at the very base. Fruit c. 14 x 5 mm, discoid-subglobose, truncate at the apex and widely umbilicate in the centre, stellate-hairy. Mericarps 20-30, c. 7 x 5 mm, ultimately black, 1-seeded, the upper edge slanting upwards into the usually sharply pointed to shortly apiculate dorsal apical angle. Seeds c. 2.5 mm long, punctate-verruculose. (from JSTOR Global Plants website / Flora Zambesiaca) Softly shrubby. Young stems, leaf-stalks and calyx with sparse long straight white hairs. Leaf-stalk c. 3 cm long, blades drooping, closely velvety on both sides, c. 4 cm long x 4 cm wide, narrowing to rather blunt tip, scarcely toothed. Flowers solitary, rather short-stalked; petals yellow, c. 1.5 cm long; fruit c. 1 cm diam., covered with star-like hairs. |
| Link(s) |
African Plant Database
JSTOR Plant Science Kew Herbarium Catalogue BGBM Berlin-Dahlem - Virtual Herbarium Züricher Herbarien iNaturalist (Namibia / Alex Dreyer) iNaturalist (Namibia) iNaturalist (southern Africa) Flora of Zimbabwe Fleurs de notre Terre - Galerie Namibie Tree Atlas of Namibia |
| Content last updated: | 18 Apr 2024 |
