Garuga pinnata Roxb.

The drupe is eaten raw, pickled or cooked, and the young shoots and leaves are said to be used as fodder (Cooke, l.c.).

A tree up to 15 m tall, young shoots pubescent. Leaves exstipulate, alternate, 15-45 cm long, imparipinnately compound with 5-10 pairs of leaflets; leaflets opposite, subsessile, up to 10 cm long, 4 cm broad, oblong-lanceolate, crenate, oblique, acuminate, usually tomentose, at least when young. Flowers in much branched panicles crowded towards the end of the shoots, bisexual or unisexual, shortly pedicellate, yellow, tomentose. Bracts deciduous. Calyx campanulate, 5-toothed valvate, tomentose outside, c.6 mm long with narrow ovate teeth. Petals 5, inserted on the hypanthium beneath the margin of the disc, valvate, tomentose outside, linear-oblong, c.8 mm long. Disc crenate, thin, lining the tube of the calyx. Filaments dilated at the base, slightly hairy, anthers dorsifixed. Ovary ovoid, hairy; style hairy. Fruit l.2-1.8 cm in diameter, black with generally 2 pyrenes. Seed with a membranous covering.

Trees 4-10 m tall; bark gray-brown, rough. Branchlets glabrous except very young parts, with conspicuous lenticels and leaf scars. Leaves with 9-23 leaflets; rachis and leaflets pubescent with long hairs, especially when young and on veins; petiolules absent to 4 mm, terminal petiolule 5-10 mm; lowest leaflet blades stipulelike, spoon-shaped or linear, 5-10 mm, early deciduous, middle blades elliptic, oblong, or lanceolate, 5-11 × 2-3 cm, base rounded, sometimes obliquely cuneate, margin sparsely serrate, apex usually narrowly acuminate; lateral veins 10-15 pairs. Panicles lateral or axillary, 7.5-19(-22) cm, densely pubescent with long hairs when young; peduncle 2-6 cm. Flowers white, yellowish white, or greenish yellow, 7-10 mm; pedicel 1-3 mm, long pubescent. Sepals deltoid, 2.5-3.5(-4) mm, pubescent on both surfaces. Petals oblong, 5-5.5 × 1.5-2 mm, pubescent with short somewhat curved hairs. Stamens slightly unequal; filaments with long hairs at base; disk lobes trapeziform or deltoid. Ovary oblong, with short stipe, sparsely pilose, especially when young; style pilose; stigma shallowly 5-lobed. Fruit globose, yellow when ripe, 11-15(-18) × (9-)11-18 mm, sometimes pubescent. Fl. Mar-Apr, fr. Apr-Oct.

Subtropical Himalaya (Nepal to Bhutan), India, Burma, Thailand, Indo-China, Malaysia.

Distribution: Native of India, E. Pakistan, Malaya and Philippines. Introduced and cultivated in Lahore.

SW Guangxi (Longzhou), Sichuan (Leibo), S and SE Yunnan (Funing, Xishuangbanna) [Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam].

300-1200 m

Fl.Per. April-May.

Mixed forests, sparse mountain forests, valley scrub; 400-1400 m.

Garuga pinnata is a deciduous tree species from the family Burseraceae.

It occurs in Asia: from the Indian sub-continent, southern China and Indo-China; in Vietnam it may be called dầu heo. No subspecies are listed in the Catalogue of Life.