The Fruits are 2½—3 inches long and 2-2½ inches broad, light brown when ripe, reddish-brown before ripe, roughly showing 3 lobes on the exterior, smooth and hard. They contain a large, hollow kernel, very hard. The fruit ripens in March.
Uses.—The leaves are used for mats, hats, baskets, fans and various plaited articles. The unripe kernel is eaten raw and the rind of the fruit is used for making sweets. Elsewhere the kernels have been used for buttons.
ISOBERLINIA DALZIELII Craib & Stapf.—Fara doka. LEGUMINOSAE.
This species is very similar to I. doka, the outstanding difference being its generally paler colour in all its parts, especially in the leaves which are covered with a grey bloom. Its habit is the same and its form similar, though it differs in having a higher and rounder crown when small, the leaves not drooping so markedly as those of the other species. The bole is longer and the tree attains a greater height than does I. doka. A height of over 60 feet with a girth of 8 feet is not uncommon in forests of this species as well as in single examples. Long, clean boles with short, rounded root-flanges and high, flat-topped crowns are typical. It regenerates with the same profusion and is as susceptible to fire as I. doka, hollow stems in old trees being the general rule. This species seems to prefer stony and shallow soils and over large areas of such it grows pure, often to the total exclusion of I. doka.
The Bark is light grey, smoother than that of I. doka, and has rather large, oval scales which leave light brown scars. The slash is pale crimson.
The Wood is light red in colour with open grain of this colour and silvery streaks. The sap is dirty white. Weight 50 lbs. a cubic foot.
The Leaves are large, very variable in size and averaging some 18 inches. They have usually 7 leaflets covered with a soft grey bloom which gives them a bluish appearance. They are rounder, paler and softer in texture than those of I. doka, and the bloom is particularly marked in young leaves which pass through the same grades of colouring from pink to green as do those of I. doka.
The Flowers are in large panicles and appear in December. Each is composed of 5 irregular white petals and 5 narrow, pointed sepals, and 10 long stamens, the whole enclosed in a blackish-green, hard, rounded case which splits into two halves in the axil of which the flower sits.