Morinda citrifolia L.

• Authority

  Britton, Nathaniel L. Flora Borinqueña.

• Family

  Rubiaceae

• Scientific Name

  Morinda citrifolia L.

• Description

  Species Description - A small tree, with broad, opposite, untoothed leaves, and small, white flowers in dense, round, stalked clusters, borne axillary, or opposite the leaves. It is native of the East Indies, but widely naturalized in the West Indies, in Porto Rico occurring sparingly in sand along the coast, as also on the island Vieques. We have found no Spanish name in use for it in Porto Rico. Morinda (Latin for Indian Mulberry) is a Linnaean genus, consisting of some 40 species of tropical trees and shrubs. Their leaves are opposite, or whorled, stipulate, their white, or red flowers densely clustered, confluent by their ovaries, the clusters ripening into a compound fruit called a syncarp. The calyx is very obscurely toothed, or without teeth; the funnelform, or salverform corolla has from 4 to 7 lobes, which do not overlap; the short stamens, borne on the throat of the corolla, are as many as its lobes; the ovary is usually 2-celled, the 2 styles united, the 2 stigmas slender. Morinda citrifolia (Citrus-leaved), becomes about 6 meters high, but is usually lower, and sometimes shrubby. The rather stout twigs are smooth. The ovate, or elliptic, pointed leaves are from 10 to 30 centimeters long, distinctly pinnately veined, smooth, except for tufts of hairs in the axils of the veins on the under side, their stout stalks 1 or 3 centimeters long, the broad round stipules about as long as the stalks. The globose, or ovoid heads of flowers are about 1.5 centimeters thick; the corolla-tube is about 6 millimeters long. The peculiar malodorous fruit, when fully mature, is from 5 to 7 centimeters long.

• Discussion

  Indian Mulberry Madder Family Morinda citrifolia Linnaeus, Species Plantarum 176. 1753.