Flora of the Hawaiian Islands
Dicotyledon Literature for Muntingia calabura
Stone, 1970; AgroForestryTree Database, accessed 10 Dec. 2010. http://www.worldagroforestry.org/sea/Products/AFDbases/af/asp/SpeciesInfo.asp?SpID=18091; Lorence & Wagner 2020.
   Muntingiaceae Bibliography
      Muntingia calabura
General Information
DistributionNative to tropical America, now widely cultivated for its edible fruit and naturalized in many tropical regions.In the Hawaiian Islands, naturalized on Kaua`i.
















Habit
Small, evergreen tree, 3‒12 m tall, branches horizontal, pendent towards the tip; branchlets, petioles, and pedicels softly pubescent with simple and gland-tipped hairs.
Leaves
Leaves distichous, simple, short-petiolate; blade ovate-lanceolate, 4‒15 cm long, 1‒6.5 cm wide, apex acuminate, base obliquely subcordate with asymmetrical sides, margin serrate, abaxial leaf surface softly grayish pubescent; petiole 3‒5 mm long; stipules linear, ca. 5 mm long, caducous.
Flowers
Inflorescences 1‒3(‒5)-flowered supra-axillary fascicles, perfect, but only first flower of fascicle forming fruit. Flowers on pedicel ca. 2‒3 cm long; sepals 5(6‒7), ca. 1 cm long, lanceolate-caudate, tomentose-hirsute; petals 5(6‒7), white or sometimes pink, broadly obovate to spatulate, 12‒13 mm long, 4‒6 mm wide; number of stamens increasing from 10‒25 in the first emerging flower in the fascicle to 75‒100 in the last, filaments slender, distinct, 6 mm long, white, anthers small, yellow; ovary stipitate, with annular disc, glabrous, 5-locular, stigma capitate, 5-ridged, persistent.
Fruit
Fruit red, 5-locular subglobose, 10‒15 mm in diameter, with several thousand tiny seeds in the soft, sweet, edible pulp.
Seeds
Seeds ellipsoid, ca. 0.5 mm long, yellowish white.
Contributor
David Lorence