Melicytus chathamicus

Detailed description

Dioecious, erect, densely branched, virgate, evergreen shrub to tree up to 10 m. tall; bark smooth, grey-green, often mottled and bearing lichen growth (Bacidia, graphid lichens especially). Branchlets 2.0–3.0 mm diameter, terete, green to green-brown, glabrescent, lenticelate, lenticels sparse. Adult leaves coriaceous, alternate glabrous; petiole 10-25 mm, plano-convex, glabrous, green or green-tinged pink or red; lamina (30-)50-120 × 20-60 mm, narrow- to broad-lanceolate, oblanceolate or oval, rarely obovate, dull to slightly glossy, green, olive-green or yellow-green, adaxially darker than abaxially, margins serrated, usually in distal half of leaf, teeth (3–)6–7–10 per margin, sometimes entire; apex, acute, subacute or obtuse; base attenuate or cuneate. Stipules 1.5–2.3 × 0.8–1.3 m, narrowly deltoid, caducous, dark green, often pink-tinged or completely red. Inflorescences (2–)4-flowered fascicles, arising from branchlets. Male flowers: pedicels 3.8–6.2 mm long, slender, decurved, glabrous. Sepals 5, unequal, imbricate, 1.8–2.6 × 1.8–2.4 mm, broadly triangular, margins ciliate, purple, apices subacute to obtuse. Corolla broadly cylindric to subcampanulate, 4.2–5.1 × 3.2–3.6 mm. Petals 5, 4.4–5.4 × 2.4–2.6 mm, oblong, distal quarter reflexed, colour variable ranging from pale yellow tinged apricot, apricot, pink or rose, margins entire, glabrous. Anthers sessile, oblong, 1.0–1.2 mm long, yellow, connate to form an urceolate tube, appendage membranous, dark yellow to orange, triangular, apex fimbriate, exceeding anthers. Gynoecium vestigial. Female flowers: pedicels 3.6–5.8 mm long, slender, decurved, glabrous. Sepals 5, unequal, imbricate, 1.6–2.4 × 1.6–2.2 mm, triangular, margins ciliate, green or purple with membranous margins, apices subacute to obtuse. Corolla broadly cylindric to subcampanulate, 4.2–5.1 × 3.2–3.6 mm. Petals 5, 4.4–5.4 × 2.4–2.6 mm, oblong, distal quarter reflexed, colour variable ranging from pale yellow tinged apricot, apricot, pink or rose, margins entire, glabrous. Anthers 0.6–0.7 mm long, vestigial, sterile; appendage membranous, orange to tan, narrowly triangular, apex fimbriate, exceeding anthers. Ovary 1.4–1.8 mm long, glabrous, broadly ovoid, greenish-white, cream or pale yellow. Style 0.3–0.4 mm long, glabrous, persistent in fruit; stigmas 2, 0.4–0.6 mm long, flat, spreading, cream or pale yellow, withering and falling. Fruit 16–18 × 14–16 mm, ovoid, globose berry, initially green, maturing white, white mottled purple, or white flushed purple; calyx persistent; mesocarp 0.8–1.3 mm thick, fleshy, white. Pyrenes 2, 4.0–5.0 × 4.0–5.2 mm, broadly ovoid to circular, with a flattened surface plane or with 2–3-faces and ridges inbetween, testa dark purple-brown, black-brown, brown or orange, surfaces distinctly tuberculate, indistinctly ridged or tuberculate.