Pouteria ramiflora

(Martius) Radlkofer

Macaranduba, Abiu

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(c) Lucas Lima (Lima, L.M.), some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Lucas Lima (Lima, L.M.)

What to Eat

Edible parts: Fruit

Fruit - raw. The fruit contains 1 - 2 large seeds surrounded by a soft, white, fleshy pulp with a slightly sweet flavour. The pear-shaped fruit is about 6cm long and 4cm wide.

Where to Find It

A tropical plant. It grows well on sandy soil. It grows naturally in the Amazon in Brazil. It grows in the tropical savannah. It grows between 200-1300 m altitude.

Amazon, Bolivia, Brazil, Central America, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Peru, South America,

Countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Belize, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, French Guiana, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Paraguay, Suriname, El Salvador, Uruguay, Venezuela

How to Identify

It is a large tree. It grows 10-25 m high. Often the trunk is short and gnarled. The young shoots have golden-brown hairs. The branches contain a milky latex like sap. The bark is cracked and scaly. The leaves are spaced and arranged in spirals. The leaves are 5-18.4 cm long by 2.5-8.4 cm wide. They are oval. There are 8-16 pairs of secondary veins. The leaf stalk is 0.6-1.8 cm long. The flowers occur in tufts of 5-15 flowers. The flowers are of one sex. The separate sexes occur on separate plants. The flowers are greenish-white. The fruit are green and egg shaped. It is 2.5-5 cm long. The fruit are edible. There is one seed. The seed is 1.6-3.2 cm long. The pulp is soft and white.

How to Grow

Plants are grown from seed. The seed are removed from ripe fruit. Seeds only remian viable for a short time. Seeds germinate in 20-40 days.

Propagation: Seed - best sown as soon as it is ripe in individual pots. Germination usually occurs in 3 - 6 weeks, although the germination rate is normally low.

Other Uses

The branches contain a milky, latex-like sap. No uses are recorded. The sapwood is almost indistinct from the heartwood. The wood is heavy, hard, of medium texture. It has little resistance to rot. The wood is used for boards, internal finishing in buildings, construction and the manufacture of toys, boxes etc.

Production

Plants grow at a moderate rate. The fruit mature 5-7 months after flowering.

Other Information

The fruit are not very popular.

Notes

There are about 150-320 Pouteria species. They grow in the tropics.

Names & Synonyms

Abiu carriola, Abiu do campo, Bacumixa, Curriola, Fruta-de-veado, Fruteira, Grao-de-galo, Graos de gallo, Guajara, Gunjara, Ibacoixa, Mandapuca, Vermelha, Pitomba de leira, Leiteiro-preto

Labatia ramiflora MartiusLabatia chrysophylloides MartiusLucuma ramiflora (Martius) A DC.Lucuma chrysophylloides (Martius) A DC.Labatia elliptica Pohl ex MiquelLucuma lateriflora Bentham ex MiquelLucuma parviflora Bentham ex MiquelPouteria chrysophylloides (Martius) RadlkoferPouteria lateriflora (Bentham ex Miquel) RadlkoferPouteria parviflora (Bentham ex Miquel) RadlkoferPseudocladia lateriflora (Bentham ex Miquel) Radlk.Microluma parviflora (Benth. ex Miquel) BaillonPouteria ramiflora (Martius) Radlk. var. grandiflora KuntzePouteria ramiflora (Martius) Radlk. var. oblongifolia KuntzePouteria ovata A C SmithParalabatia parviflora (Benth.ex Miqu.) AubrevilleParalabatia ramiflora (Martius) AubrevilleRichardella parviflora (Benth. ex Miquel) Baehni

References (12)

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Paz, F. S., et al, 2021, Edible Fruit Plant Species in the Amazon Forest Rely Mostly on Bees and Beetles as Pollinators. Journal of Economic Entomology, XX(XX), 2021, 1–13
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www.colecionandofrutas.org