Cordia crenata - Toothed-Leaf Cordia

Toothed-Leaf Cordia is shrub or small tree, growing up to 7 m tall. Young plant parts are hairy. Leaves are alternate, stalked, leaf-stalks 0.4-3.5 cm long; blades usually narrowly elliptic to ovate or obovate, rarely nearly round to rhombic, 1.8-10.8 cm long, 1.3-7 cm wide; base rounded to wedge-shaped, tip usually blunt and apiculate to almost flat or rounded, rarely notched; margins entire to sawtoothed or rounded toothed, at least towards the tip; both surfaces sparsely to densely velvet-hairy when young, often soon becoming hairless, never rough. Flowers are borne in lax to dense, stalked clusters, carried on flower-cluster-stalks 1-3.4 cm long. Flowers are stalked, white or cream, tube 2-5 mm long, with 4-5 petals; male flowers have 4 stamens and very reduced pistillode, female flowers have stigmatic branches 1-7 mm long. Sepal-cup is tubular-bell-shaped in flower, funnel- or cup-shaped in fruit, 2.5-6 mm long in flower, 3.8-8 mm long and 5-8 mm in diameter in fruit, 3-4-lobed, not prominently veined, exterior sparsely to densely velvet-hairy. The edible fruits are oval and orange and 1.3 cm long by 8 mm wide, with one seed. Toothed-Leaf Cordia is native to Africa, Arabian Peninsula and India. In India it is seen in Gujarat and Rajasthan.