Description

A shrub in the savanna or a huge liane of secondary deciduous and dense forests, attaining 100 m long by over 1 m girth, occurring from Guinea to W Cameroons, and extending across central Africa to Sudan, Uganda and southern Tanganyika. Three varieties are recognized of which var. owariensis only is in the West African region.This is certainly the commonest of the Landolphia spp. It survives bush-fires, and its rhizomes after a burn often put up a coppice of short shoots which even before becoming lignified will bear flowers and fruits (12). Before the days of monopoly of natural rubber sources by hevea plantations, this was a very important source of vine-rubber. It has been exploited as a forest-produce throughout its range, and plantations of it have at times been established in Ivory Coast. During the 1939–45 war it regained an ephemeral interest as a substitute for hevea rubber. In the Nigerian and Cameroons high-forest, yields of 22–180 kg per sq mile of forest (period not stated, but presumably per year) were recorded, and a skilled tapper could obtain 7½ kg per month, at the expense of much dangerous tree-climbing (1). The normal method of extraction is by incision, but excision tapping as for hevea has been practised in Sierra Leone (2). In earlier times wasteful methods of extraction were employed. In Nigeria (5, 10, 13, 16) and in Gabon (15), the bark of both stems and roots was stripped, pounded, soaked and boiled to produce a commercial product known as ’red cluster rubber’, or ‘root rubber’. Stripping of the roots killed the plant there and then. Stripping of the lianous stems only postponed somewhat inevitable death. In Ghana legislation required the rubber to be made up in string-form which was then wound into balls and traded as ‘ball rubber’ or according to its place of origin, e.g. ‘Adele ball rubber’ from the Adeli District of Togo (5). The latex normally is white but may be red, pink or amber, and when obtained by incision or excision is variable. Usually it coagulates immediately, but at some seasons or at certain places it remains fluid enough to run into a collecting vessel when coagulation is done by lime-juice or salt-water (5). The resultant rubber is of good quality, but latex from some lianes will not coagulate and remains tacky. This is commonly used as a bird-lime to catch small birds and other animals (12), especially on rice farms in Sierra Leone to trap birds depredating the crop at ripening time. This latex is also used in the Region in lotions and is taken internally against intestinal worms (12), or it may be used as an enema for the same purpose (14).The twigs are used in Ghana as chewsticks (7, 9).The roots and leaves are used in The Gambia in medicines (6) for unspecified purposes. Leaves are boiled in some parts for application to sprains (12). In Congo sap expressed from the leaves is dripped into the eyes and used to wash the patient’s face in a treatment for giddiness and epilepsy; sap is rubbed with massage into scarifications over areas of oedema and rheumatism; and decoction of roots or green fruits is drunk as a purgative and for urethral discharge. The liquid of this preparation is used in steam-baths for feverish aches (3).A trace of flavones is reported in the leaves, and tannin, steroids and terpenes in the roots (4).The fruits, resembling small oranges, are edible and are esteemed in all areas. The pulp is acid. It is recorded as a source of vitamins (11). In various parts it is fermented to give an alcoholic drink (5, 8, 9).