shringtaka :

Streblus asper Trunk and canopy Photograph by: AlleinStein

Morphology:

It is a small, rigid, evergreen tree with latex and grows upto 15 meter in height.

Twigs are hairy and interwoven.

Bark is rough grey to greenish in colour. Leaves are simple, alternate, rhomboid, elliptic, acute or acuminate more or less crenate-scabrid on both surfaces.

Floral Characteristics

It flowers from January to March. Flowers are dioecious. Males heads are globose, minute and yellowish-green in colour.

Female flowers are very small, solitary or 2-4 together. Dioecious plants are to be planted in 3:1 female and male ratio for higher fruit yield.

Tree produces succulent large drupes during April to May, Drupes have fleshy base.

The fruits are yellow when ripe and single seeded.

Seeds are smooth, round, greenish-white in colour and light in weight.

Histology:

Shows a cork consisting of 4-10 layers of thin-walled, rectangular and tangentially arranged cells; cork cambium single layered; secondary cortex Consists of 3-4 layers of thin-walled, somewhat rectangular or circular to polygonal cells; a number of stone cells present either in singles or in groups in tangential bands; stone cells of two types, one having thick-walled and narrow lumen while the other having comparatively thinner wall and wider lumen; they vary in shape, being rectangular, oval, circular to conical, each with simple pits on their walls and radiating canals; secondary phloem consists of sieve elements, parenchyma, phloem fibres and stone cells, traversed by phloem rays; phloem parenchyma thin-walled, circular to oval in shape, phloem fibres moderately thick-walled and lignified with wide lumen, occurring in singles or in groups and radially arranged; stone cells similar to those present in cortical region, occur throughout the phloem; phloem rays thin-walled, rectangular and radially elongated in transverse section, a few ray cells also converted into stone cells; prismatic crystals of calcium oxalate occur throughout the tissues of bark.

Kotakkal Ayurveda - Mother land of modern ayurveda

shringtaka - Streblus asper Linn. - Moraceae

shringtaka :

Morphology:

Histology:

Medicinal Plants