Common Name:

General Information

Ficus pritchardii is a shrub or a tree that can grow from 2 - 25 metres tall[].
The plant is harvested from the wild for local use as a source of food and medicine.

Known Hazards

None known

Botanical References

Range

Pacific - Fiji.

Habitat

Dense or open forest or on its edges and in thickets, sometimes on open slopes, and rarely on the inner edges of mangrove swamps; at elevations up to 1,150 metres[].

Properties

Edibility Rating
Medicinal Rating
Habit	Tree
Height	15.00 m
Pollinators	Wasps
Cultivation Status	Wild

Cultivation Details

As far as noted, the inflorescences always arise from the main trunk and often very near its base; they are borne profusely on woody, slender, specialized branches 50 - 200m. long, or sometimes in dense, compact masses as much as 150cm. In diameter[].
The fruits may be found throughout the year[].
Fig trees have a unique form of fertilization, each species relying on a single, highly specialized species of wasp that is itself totaly dependant upon that fig species in order to breed. The trees produce three types of flower; male, a long-styled female and a short-styled female flower, often called the gall flower. All three types of flower are contained within the structure we usually think of as the fruit.
The female fig wasp enters a fig and lays its eggs on the short styled female flowers while pollinating the long styled female flowers. Wingless male fig wasps emerge first, inseminate the emerging females and then bore exit tunnels out of the fig for the winged females. Females emerge, collect pollen from the male flowers and fly off in search of figs whose female flowers are receptive. In order to support a population of its pollinator, individuals of a Ficus spp. must flower asynchronously. A population must exceed a critical minimum size to ensure that at any time of the year at least some plants have overlap of emmission and reception of fig wasps. Without this temporal overlap the short-lived pollinator wasps will go locally extinct[].

Edible Uses

Fruit[, ]. The figs turn from green to dark red or purplish brown when mature and attain a diameter of 30 mm[].

Medicinal

The plant juices are reported to be applied to wounds[].

Other Uses

None known

Propagation

Seed -

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