Compilation
Reptonia buxifolia

Spiny shrub or small tree 7–10 m tall, occasionally recorded as a medium-sized tree to 15 m tall; spines in juvenile plants many, thin and leafless, hardly longer than the leaves, in mature plants stronger and longer, and often carrying small clusters of leaves and flowers, or occasionally the plant is unarmed; milky latex usually scarce; branchlets grey, silky, with medifixed hairs. Leaves alternate; petiole 0.4–0.8 cm long; blade leathery, 1–4 x 0.4–2.5 cm, spathulate to elliptic, cuneate at the base, rounded at the apex, margin often recurved, glabrous above, grey, silky below; veins obscure. Inflorescences dense axillary clusters, sometimes in axils of fallen leaves, usually restricted to older branches, sometimes also on older spines; pedicel c. 1 mm long. Flowers c. 2.5 mm long. Calyx 5-lobed, with a short basal tube, with rust-coloured silky hairs; lobes overlapping, broadly ovate with rounded apex, c. 0.8 x 0.6 mm. Corolla 5-lobed, with a short basal tube, yellow; lobes ovate with rounded apex, c. 1 x 0.8 mm. Stamens 5, 1–2 mm long, exceeding the corolla, filaments c. 1 mm long, anthers c. 1 mm long, opening outwards. Ovary globose, silky, c. 0.5 mm in diam., 1-celled with 5 basal ovules on a short placenta. Fruit a 1-seeded berry, 5–8 mm in diam. Seed almost globose, yellowish-brown, c. 5 mm in diam.; scar basal, small and circular.