A tree, in Florida rarely more than 15° high, with a short gnarled contorted trunk 3°—4° in diameter, stout branches forming a round compact head, and stout terete branchlets, with thick pith, light orange color, marked by oblong pale lenticels, gradually growing darker in their second and third years; frequently a shrub, with semiprostrate stems; in the West Indies often 50° tall. Bark about 1/16′ thick, smooth, light brown and marked by large irregular pale blotches. Wood very heavy, hard, close-grained, dark brown or violet color, with thick lighter colored sapwood; sometimes used in cabinet-making.
Distribution. Saline shores and beaches; Florida, from Mosquito Inlet to the southern keys on the east coast, and from Tampa Bay to Cape Sable on the west coast; common on the Bermuda and Bahama Islands, in the Antilles, and in South America from Colombia to Brazil.
2. [Coccolobis laurifolia] Jacq. Pigeon Plum.
Leaves ovate, ovate-lanceolate or obovate-oblong, rounded or acute at apex, rounded or cuneate at base, with slightly undulate revolute margins, thick and firm, bright green above, paler below, 3′—4′ long, 1½′—2′ wide, with a conspicuous pale midrib and 3 or 4 pairs of remote primary veins connected by prominent reticulate veinlets; petioles stout, flattened, ½′ in length, abruptly enlarged at base; stipular sheath glabrous, ½′ wide. Flowers in early spring, on slender pedicels ¼′ long, in few or 1-flowered fascicles on racemes terminal on short axillary branches of the previous year, and 2′—3′ in length; calyx ⅛′ across, the cup-shaped lobes rather shorter than the stamens, with slender yellow filaments enlarged at base, and dark orange-colored anthers; ovary oblong, with elongated stigmatic lobes. Fruit in erect or spreading sparsely-fruited racemes, ripening during the winter and early spring, ovoid, narrowed at base, rounded at apex, dark red, ⅓′ long, with thin acidulous flesh and a hard thin-walled light brown nutlet.
A glabrous tree, 60°—70° high, with a tall straight trunk 1°—2° in diameter, spreading branches forming a dense round-topped head, slender terete slightly zigzag branchlets usually contorted and covered with light orange-colored bark, becoming darker and tinged with red in their second or third year. Wood heavy, exceedingly hard, strong, brittle, close-grained, rich dark brown tinged with red, with thick lighter colored sapwood; occasionally used in cabinet-making.
Distribution. One of the largest and most abundant of the tropical trees of the seacoast of southern Florida from Cape Canaveral to the keys and on the west coast from Cape Romano to Cape Sable; common on the Bahama Islands, on many of the Antilles, and in Venezuela.
XV. NYCTAGINACEÆ.
Trees with alternate stalked persistent leaves without stipules. Flowers perfect or unisexual; calyx corolla-like, 5-lobed; stamens 5—8; ovule campylotropous. Fruit anthocarpus, crowned by the persistent teeth of the calyx. Seed erect; cotyledons unequal, folded round the soft scanty albumen; radicle short, inferior, turned toward the hilum. A family of about twenty genera widely distributed chiefly in the warmer and tropical parts of the New World, with a single arborescent representative in North America.