Lonchocarpus laxiflorus Guill. & Perrott.

Leguminosae

Common names

Folali, Polinirki

Description

A small tree 5-6 m high, bole up to 25 cm dbh, with a narrow open canopy, bark fibrous, fairly smooth, grey-yellowish, slash yellowish with black or red streaks. Twigs glabrous, grey-yelllowih striate. Leaves alternate, imparipinnate 10-20 cm long, with 3-5 pairs of ovate or elliptic 3-18 x 1.5-7 cm long leaflets. Tip acuminate or emarginate, base short and wedged, petiolets 0.6 cm long, stipulets minute and deciduous. Leaves glabrous or nearly so, glaucous. Nervation fairly conspicuous, pennate with 5-13 pairs of secondary nerves, joining towards the tip. Flowers very decorative, blue-lilac, purple or pink, fragrant, known as "king's flower", 1-2 cm long. Fruit elliptic pod thin and flattened, yellowish, 12 x 7 cm. Wood yellow, hard and heavy.

Soil

Found on well watered soils.

Distribution

Uncommon, sparsely distributed, in the Guinean and Sudanian savannas extending to the South border of the Sahel. Extending from the Atlantic to the Red Sea and to East Africa.

Products & uses

Leaves are an occasional fodder for goats and bark eaten by wildlife. Flowers and immature pods are human food. There are many medicinal uses of leaves and pounded bark and roots: to cure jaundice and liver disorders, to dress wounds, for stomach aches, vermifugal, tonic drink, anti helminthic, anti flatulence and intestinal disorders. Leaves provide also an indigo dye, sometimes referred to as Gambian Indigo.

References

Aubréville 1950 ; Baumer 1975 ; Geerling 1982/88 ; Burkill 1995.