Xylopia monosperma Jessup

Jessup, L.W. (2007) Flora of Australia 2: 448. Type: Queensland, cultivated Tolga, originally from Andoom Creek, Weipa, 17 Sept. 1990, G. Sankowsky 1103 & N. Sankowsky. Holo: BRI.

Seldom exceeding 30 cm dbh. Blaze finely layered and odour strong but difficult to describe.

Leaf blades about 5-7 x 2-3.5 cm. Lateral veins forming loops inside the blade margin. Oil dots visible with a lens. Pale lenticels usually numerous and obvious on the twigs. Fine oak grain in the twigs and expanded rays in the twig bark.

Features not available.

Fruiting carpels obliquely ovoid or ellipsoid, about 20-24 x 16-18 mm on stalks about 2-6 mm long. Seeds about 10 x 6 mm, almost completely covered by a white aril, one per carpel. Inner surface of the fruit +/- red. Embryo minute.

First leaves lanceolate to elliptic, apex mucronate. Midrib slightly depressed on the upper surface. Lower surface bluish-green, somewhat pruinose, clothed in appressed ginger-coloured hairs. Oil dots visible with a lens. Lateral veins forming loops inside the blade margin. At the tenth leaf stage: twigs clothed in rusty brown, short upright hairs. Seed germination time 82 to 494 days.

Occurs in NT and CYP. An inconspicuous species found in the Heathlands and Iron Range areas of Cape York Peninsula, and on the Tiwi Islands in the Northern Territory. Altitudinal range from near sea level to about 100 m. Grows in poorly developed rain forest.

Food plant for the larval stages of the Green Spotted Triangle Butterfly. Sankowsky & Neilsen (2000).