Cynometra iripa Kostel.

Kosteletzky, V.F. (1835), Allgemeine Medizinisch-Pharmazeutische Flora 4: 1341. Type: Rheede, Hort. Malab. 4: t. 31 (1683).

Wrinkle Pod Mangrove

Grows as a shrub or small tree to 7 m, sometimes multistemmed.

New leaves green. Leaves compound with one to two pairs of leaflets. Basal leaflet blades about 0.8-5 x 0.5-3 cm, terminal leaflet blades 2.3-8.5 x 1.1-5 cm; unequal sided, leaflet stalks to 3 mm long, mostly enclosed by leaflet base. Stipules small and inconspicuous or absent. Lateral veins forming loops well inside the blade margin, 6-10 pairs.

Inflorescence 3-9 flowered. Sepals 4, about 2.5-3 mm long, apex ciliate, white or very pale pink. Petals 5, about 2-3 mm long, white or very pale pink. Stamens 10. Ovary hairy. Ovules 1-2 per ovary.

Fruit on a 6-10 mm long pedicel, an asymmetrical, somewhat suborbicular flattened nut, 30-40 x 30-34 x 17.5-20 mm, brown coloured, deeply rugose, distinctly beaked part way along dorsl side, seed 1, rarely 2.

Seed germination time 32 days. Cotyledons thick and fleshy, at or slightly above ground level, about 2.5-3.0 x 2.0 cm. Cataphylls about 5 or 6 before the first true leaves. First pair of leaves compound with two leaflets. At the tenth leaf stage: compound leaves with two pairs of leaflets, each leaflet blade about 2.8 x 1.3 to 8.5 x 3.3 cm. Leaflet stalk absent or very short.

Occurs in NT, CYP, NEQ and CEQ. Altitudinal range from near sea level to 20 m. Grows in back mangrove forest and rarely in adjacent vine forest. Also occurs in Asia, Malesia and the Pacific islands.

Description adapted from Cooper (2015).

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