Common Name:

General Information

Ficus trachypison is a tree that is probably deciduous; it can grow up to 30 metres tall. The crooked bole is markedly fluted; it can be free of branches for up to half its height, 50cm or more in diameter with buttresses around 150cm high[, ].
The plant is harvested from the wild for local use as a food and source of materials.

Known Hazards

None known

Botanical References

Range

Southeast Asia - Indonesia to New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.

Habitat

A canopy tree in dense, primary, lowland and mountain forest, also in the more open, secondary formations; at elevations up to 1,500 metres[, ].

Properties

Edibility Rating
Other Uses Rating
Habit	Deciduous Tree
Height	25.00 m
Pollinators	Wasps
Self-fertile	No
Cultivation Status	Wild

Cultivation Details

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[].

Medicinal

None known

Other Uses

The bark is fibrous. It is used for making cordage, cloth and maybe also to make tapa bark cloth[, ].

The fibrous branches used to clean teeth[].

The leaves of some species are used to wrap food for cooking[].

The leaves are quite rough and can be used as a sandpaper substitute and for scouring pots[].

The wood of plants in this genus is usually of low quality, light in weight, soft and not very durable. It is sometimes used for purposes such as light construction, digging sticks, yam stakes, etc.
The wood is also used for fuel and sometimes for making fire by friction[].

Propagation

Seed -

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