Common Name:

General Information

Ficus montana is an erect or creeping, laxly branched, very variable shrub that can grow up to 2 metres long. It is not epiphytic[, ].
The plant is sometimes harvested from the wild for local use as a food and medicine.

Known Hazards

None known

Botanical References

Range

E. Asia - Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, New Guinea.

Habitat

In gullies, hard soils, forest edges, bamboo thickets, teak forests, etc., at elevations up to 1,300 metres[].

Properties

Edibility Rating
Medicinal Rating
Habit	Shrub
Height	2.00 m
Pollinators	Wasps
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 - raw[]. A sweetish flavour[]. The greenish-white to red fruit is around 8 - 13mm in diameter[].

Young leaves - raw[]. Eaten in salads[].

Medicinal

The roots, in combination with other ingredients, are used in the treatment of syphilis[].

The leaves are smoked together with opium[].

Other Uses

None known

Propagation

Seed -

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Captcha: if i have 3 bananas, and i eat them all, how many bananas did i just eat?