Cordia boissieri

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Cordia boissieri
Cordia boisseri whole.jpg
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Boraginales
Family: Boraginaceae
Genus: Cordia
Species:
C. boissieri
Binomial name
Cordia boissieri
Cordia boissieri range map.png
Natural range

Cordia boissieri is a white-flowered, evergreen shrub or small tree in the borage family (Boraginaceae). Its native range extends from southern Texas in the United States south to central Mexico. Common names include anacahuita, Mexican olive, [1] white cordia, and Texas wild olive. [2] It is named after the Swiss explorer and botanist Pierre Edmond Boissier.

Contents

Description

Wild Olive (Cordia boissieri), FM 1017, Jim Hogg County, Texas, USA (10 April 2016) Wild Olive (Cordia boissieri), FM 1017, Jim Hogg County, Texas, USA (10 April 2016).jpg
Wild Olive (Cordia boissieri), FM 1017, Jim Hogg County, Texas, USA (10 April 2016)

Cordia boissieri reaches a height of 5–7 m (16–23 ft), with a symmetrical round crown 3–5 m (9.8–16.4 ft) in diameter. The ovate leaves are 9–18 cm (3.5–7.1 in) long and 5–9 cm (2.0–3.5 in) wide. [3] It is evergreen but will lose leaves if it suffers frost damage [4] The white, funnel-shaped flowers are 3–5 cm (1.2–2.0 in) across [3] and are present on the tree throughout the year. [5] The drupes [6] are yellow-green, olive-like, and 1.2–2.4 cm (0.47–0.94 in) in length. They are sweet but slightly toxic when fresh, causing dizziness in humans and other animals. [3] The tree has a lifespan of 30–50 years. [7]

Uses

Jellies made from the fruits are reportedly safe to eat. A syrup made from the fruits is used to dye cloth and treat coughs. The leaves are used to alleviate rheumatism and pulmonary illness. The wood is used as firewood and for carpentry. [3] Anacahuita is cultivated as an ornamental for its compact size and showy flowers. It is hardy to USDA Zone 9a. [8]

Ecology

Cordia boissieri is a host plant for the wild olive tortoise beetle ( Physonota alutacea ). [9]

Symbolism

Anacahuita is the official flower of the state of Nuevo León in Mexico. [4]

Related Research Articles

<i>Asimina</i> North American Genus of fruit trees

Asimina is a genus of small trees or shrubs described as a genus in 1763. Asimina is the only temperate genus in the tropical and subtropical flowering plant family Annonaceae. Asimina have large, simple leaves and large fruit. It is native to eastern North America and collectively referred to as pawpaw. The genus includes the widespread common pawpaw Asimina triloba, which bears the largest edible fruit indigenous to the United States. Pawpaws are native to 26 states of the U.S. and to Ontario in Canada. The common pawpaw is a patch-forming (clonal) understory tree found in well-drained, deep, fertile bottomland and hilly upland habitat. Pawpaws are in the same plant family (Annonaceae) as the custard apple, cherimoya, sweetsop, soursop, and ylang-ylang; the genus is the only member of that family not confined to the tropics.

<i>Cordia</i> Genus of flowering plants in the borage family

Cordia is a genus of flowering plants in the borage family, Boraginaceae. It contains about 300 species of shrubs and trees, that are found worldwide, mostly in warmer regions. Many of the species are commonly called manjack, while bocote may refer to several Central American species in Spanish.

<i>Syzygium samarangense</i> Species of Asian fruit tree in the flowering plant family Myrtaceae

Syzygium samarangense is a species of flowering plant in the family Myrtaceae, native to an area that includes the Greater Sunda Islands, Malay Peninsula, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, but introduced in prehistoric times to a wider area and now widely cultivated in the tropics. Common names in English include wax apple, Java apple, Semarang rose-apple, and wax jambu.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cherimoya</span> Edible fruit-bearing species of the genus Annona

The cherimoya, also spelled chirimoya and called chirimuya by the Inca people, is a species of edible fruit-bearing plant in the genus Annona, from the family Annonaceae, which includes the closely related sweetsop and soursop. The plant has long been believed to be native to Ecuador and Peru, with cultivation practised in the Andes and Central America, although a recent hypothesis postulates Central America as the origin instead, because many of the plant's wild relatives occur in this area.

<i>Cornus canadensis</i> Species of flowering plant

Cornus canadensis is a species of flowering plant in the dogwood family Cornaceae, native to eastern Asia and North America. Common names include Canadian dwarf cornel, Canadian bunchberry, quatre-temps, crackerberry, and creeping dogwood. Unlike its relatives, which are for the most part substantial trees and shrubs, C. canadensis is a creeping, rhizomatous perennial growing to about 20 centimetres tall.

<i>Cartrema americana</i> Species of shrub

Cartrema americana, commonly called American olive, wild olive, or devilwood, is an evergreen shrub or small tree native to southeastern North America, in the United States from Virginia to Texas, and in Mexico from Nuevo León south to Oaxaca and Veracruz.

<i>Malpighia</i> Genus of shrubs

Malpighia is a genus of flowering plants in the nance family, Malpighiaceae. It contains about 45 species of shrubs or small trees, all of which are native to the American tropics. The generic name honours Marcello Malpighi, a 17th-century Italian physician and botanist. The species grow to 1–6 m (3.3–19.7 ft) tall, with a dense, often thorny crown. The leaves are evergreen, simple, 0.5–15 cm (0.20–5.91 in) long, with an entire or serrated margin. The flowers are solitary or in umbels of two to several together, each flower 1–2 cm (0.39–0.79 in) diameter, with five white, pink, red, or purple petals. The fruit is a red, orange, or purple drupe, containing two or three hard seeds. M. emarginata is cultivated for its sweet and juicy fruits, which are very rich in vitamin C.

<i>Cordia sebestena</i> Species of tree

Cordia sebestena is a shrubby tree in the borage family, Boraginaceae, native to the American tropics. It ranges from southern Florida in the United States and the Bahamas, southwards throughout Central America and the Greater Antilles. Common names have included siricote or kopté (Mayan) in 19th Century northern Yucatán, scarlet cordia in Jamaica, and Geiger tree in Florida.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jabuticaba</span> Tree in the family Myrtaceae

Jabuticaba, also spelled Jaboticaba, is the edible fruit of the jabuticabeira or Brazilian grapetree. The purplish-black, white-pulped fruit grows directly on the trunk of the tree, making it an example of 'cauliflory'. It is eaten raw or used to make jellies, jams, juice or wine. The tree, of the family Myrtaceae, is native to the states of Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais, Goiás and São Paulo in Brazil. Related species in the genus Myrciaria, often referred to by the same common names, are native to Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Peru and Bolivia.

<i>Diospyros nigra</i> Species of tree

Diospyros nigra, the black sapote, is a species of persimmon. Common names include chocolate pudding fruit, black soapapple and zapote prieto. The tropical fruit tree is native to Mexico, Central America, and Colombia. The common name sapote refers to any soft, edible fruit. Black sapote is not related to white sapote nor mamey sapote. The genus Diospyros has numerous other fruit bearing tree species in addition to the persimmons and black sapote.

<i>Ligustrum vulgare</i> Species of flowering plant


Ligustrum vulgare is a species of Ligustrum native to central and southern Europe, north Africa and southwestern Asia, from Ireland and southwestern Sweden south to Morocco, and east to Poland and northwestern Iran.

<i>Erythrostemon mexicanus</i> Species of legume

Erythrostemon mexicanus, formerly Caesalpinia mexicana, is a species of plant in the genus Erythrostemon, within the pea family, Fabaceae. Common names include Mexican holdback, Mexican caesalpinia, and tabachín del monte. It is native to the extreme lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas and to parts of Mexico: in the northeast and further south along the Gulf coast as well as the Pacific coast in Nayarit, Jalisco, Colima, and a small portion of Sinaloa.

Ulmus boissieriGrudz.,, a disputed species of elm found in Iran, was identified by Grudzinskaya in 1977. She equated her "new species" with the U. campestris f. microphylla collected in 1859 in Kerman Province and described in his Flora Orientalis (1879) by Boissier, for whom she named it, treating Boissier's specimen as the "type". The tree is endemic the provinces of Kermanshah and Kerman., and also the Zagros forests, growing with Quercus brantii, Celtis australis, Platanus orientalis, Fraxinus sp., and Cerasus mahaleb.

<i>Ehretia anacua</i> Species of tree

Ehretia anacua is medium-sized tree found in eastern Mexico and southern Texas in the United States. It is a member of the borage family, Boraginaceae. One of its common names, anacua, is derived from the Mexican Spanish word anacahuite, as is that of the related Cordia boissieri, the anacahuita. That word in turn is derived from the Nahuatl words āmatl, meaning "paper," and cuahuitl, meaning "tree," possibly referring to the bark. It is also known as knockaway, a corruption of anacua, and sandpaper tree. Alternate spellings are anaqua and anachua.

<i>Diospyros texana</i> Species of tree

Diospyros texana is a species of persimmon that is native to central, south and west Texas and southwest Oklahoma in the United States, and eastern Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas in northeastern Mexico. Common names include Texas persimmon, Mexican persimmon and the more ambiguous "black persimmon". It is known in Spanish as chapote, chapote manzano, or chapote prieto, all of which are derived from the Nahuatl word tzapotl. That word also refers to several other fruit-bearing trees.

<i>Chiococca alba</i> Species of flowering plant

Chiococca alba is a species of flowering plant in the coffee family (Rubiaceae) native to Florida and the extreme southern tip of Texas in the United States, Bermuda, Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, the Galápagos, and tropical South America. Common names include David's milkberry, West Indian milkberry, cahinca and West Indian snowberry. The specific epithet, alba, means "white" in Latin and refers to the color of its fruits.

<i>Cordia dichotoma</i> Species of plant

Cordia dichotoma is a species of flowering tree in the borage family, Boraginaceae, that is native to the Indomalayan realm, northern Australia, and western Melanesia.

<i>Prunus caroliniana</i> Species of tree

Prunus caroliniana, known as the Carolina laurelcherry, Carolina cherry laurel, Carolina cherry, or Cherry laurel, is a small evergreen flowering tree native to the lowlands of Southeastern United States, from North Carolina south to Florida and westward to central Texas. The species also has escaped into the wild in a few places in California.

<i>Physonota alutacea</i> Species of beetle

Physonota alutacea, the wild olive tortoise beetle, is a species of leaf beetle in the family Chrysomelidae. It is found in Central America, North America, and South America.

References

  1. 1 2 "Cordia boissieri". Germplasm Resources Information Network . Agricultural Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture . Retrieved 2009-12-09.
  2. Llamas, Kirsten Albrecht (2003). Tropical Flowering Plants: A Guide to Identification and Cultivation. Timber Press. p. 147. ISBN   978-0-88192-585-2.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Lara, Teresa Rojas; Robert E. Paull (2008). Jules Janick; Robert E. Paull (eds.). The Encyclopedia of Fruit & Nuts. CABI. p. 187. ISBN   978-0-85199-638-7.
  4. 1 2 Mild, Christina (2003). "Cordia boissieri" (PDF). Rio Delta Wild. Retrieved 2009-12-09.
  5. "Cordia boissieri A. DC". Native Plant Information Network. Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. Retrieved 2009-10-20.
  6. "Wild Olive, Mexican Olive, Anacahuita Cordia boissieri". Texas Native Trees. Texas A&M University. Retrieved 2009-10-20.
  7. "A Guide to Growing Healthy Trees in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas" (PDF). Valley Proud Environmental Council. 2007. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-28. Retrieved 2009-12-09.
  8. Gilman and, Edward F.; Dennis G. Watson. "Cordia boissieri: Wild-Olive". Electronic Data Information System. University of Florida IFAS Extension. Retrieved 2010-04-04.
  9. Quinn, Mike. "Wild Olive Tortoise Beetle Physonota alutacea Boheman, 1854". Texas Beetle Information. Texas Entomology. Retrieved 2010-04-04.