CROTON AMABILIS Müll. Arg.—Koriba. EUPHORBIACEAE.
A small, erect tree from 10-25 feet high which will grow in the extreme north in the driest and most barren of soils. It flourishes round the parallel 14° north and extends right down to the extreme south also. It is often a stunted, shrub-like tree growing in quantities on bare, hard, stony soils, but in more open sandy localities will grow a 15 feet bole with an open light crown composed of erect, slender branches. Old trees spread wide and give a little shade. It can be at once distinguished by the silvery glister of its leaf on the under side and by the spikes of closed flowers.
The Bark is grey or light brown with small, close-fitting, even-sized polygonal or rectangular scales.
The Wood is pale yellow, discoloured grey in patches. The rings are fine, close, light lines, the pores are very fine, numerous and evenly distributed, connected by very fine lines of soft tissue, narrower than the pores. The grain is fine and the wood is hard, difficult to saw, not hard to plane and finishes with a hard, smooth surface which will polish. The weight is 64 lbs. a cubic foot.
The Leaves are long, narrow and pointed, 4 inches long and 1½ inches broad with a 1½ inch stalk. The upper surface is a dark shining green, the lower glistening silver with minute rust spots all over the surface. The mid-rib is sunk on the upper and very prominent on the under surface. The lateral nerves are numerous and parallel. The stalk and mid-rib are covered with soft brown hairs. The young leaf is bronze or red-coloured. The leaves droop and tend to fold up along the mid-rib.
The Flowers are of two sexes, each on a different tree (dioecious). They are in racemes, resembling long spikes. The male are the longer, up to 4 inches, the female up to 2 inches. The male flower has 5 sepals, 5 petals and some 15 stamens all packed up in the bracts, on short stalks. The females have similar flowers with 3-part styles each with a bifid stigma. The flower parts are hardly visible to the naked eye so closely folded are the bracts.
The Fruit is a capsule, 3-lobed, one seed in each lobe. They ripen about November onwards, but may be found for many months in the year.
