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Indo-China Alder
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Indo-China Alder
P Native Photo: M. Sawmliana
Common name: Indo-China Alder • Bor: Heloch • Garo: Chham-chholja, Khuta, Khokora • Mizo: Chhawntual • Nepali: Kalikath • Oriya: Massania, Pata Kharalla, Kasua
Botanical name: Aporosa octandra var. octandra    Family: Phyllanthaceae (Amla family)
Synonyms: Aporosa dioica, Aporosa frutescens, Alnus dioica

Indo-China Alder is a small tree up to 9 m tall, usually shrubby in secondary forest, about 2 m tall; branchlets hairy to hairless. Stipules are ovate-lanceshaped, 4-6 mm; leaf-stalk 5-12 mm, sparsely velvet-hairy, tip bilateral with 2 glands; leaf blade elliptic, narrowly ovate, oblong-elliptic, obovate, or inverted-lanceshaped, 6-12 x 3.5-6 cm, leathery, hairless and lucid above, sparsely velvet-hairy along nerves below, base rounded or wedge-shaped, margin entire or sparsely shallowly toothed, tip rounded to pointed. Male flowers are borne in leaf-axils in about 2.5 x 0.4 cm spikes; sepals usually 4, oblong-ovate; stamens 2-4, longer than sepals. Female spikes cylindrical, shorter than the male one. Sepals are 4-6, triangular, margins fringed with hairs. Capsules are ellipsoid, 1-1.3 cm, velvet-hairy, 2-seeded. Indo-China Alder is found in the Himalayas to S. Central China and Indo-China, at altitudes of 200-1000 m. Flowering: All year.

Identification credit: M. Sawmliana Photographed in Khawbung, Mizoram.

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