Description
Native to Central and South America, Bacuripari is an evergreen tree 5 to 10 meters tall, occasionally to 15 meters. Trunk straight with brown, mottled, often rough-textured bark. Crown densely foliaged, pyramidal-shaped, becoming rounder with age.
Leaves dark red when young ageing to dark green, long and narrow, leathery texture, arranged opposite along the branches.
Flowers white, small, fleshy born in small clusters with separate female and male flowers on the same tree. Reports on flowering in tropical regions suggests flowering peaks during the dry season.
Fruit egg-shaped, medium-sized, nippled, maturing to orange-yellow 4 to 6 months after flowering, with the skin on over-ripe fruit often cracked and stained brown by latex. Pulp white, juicy with an agreeable slightly sour flavour surrounds 1 to 4 large seed. Consumed primarily as fresh fruit.
Bacuripari trees are adapted to climates with air temperatures in the range 19 to 35 C and annual rainfall between 1500 and 3500mm. Reported to perform satisfactorily on a wide range of soils, including limestone soils, and to be tolerant of flooding.
Propagation is usually from seed, which lose their viability quickly and should be planted within a couple of days after removal from the fruit. Seed are reported to germinate within 4 to 7 weeks. Seedling trees start bearing fruit when 5 to 10 years old.
Problem feature: There does not appear to be any records of escape and naturalisation anywhere. [Edit]