Common Name:

General Information

Tetrorchidium didymostemon is an evergreen shrub or a tree, sometimes adopting a climbing habit; it can grow up to 25 metres tall, with drooping branches. The bole can be 60cm or more in diameter[, ].
The tree is harvested from the wild for local use as a medicine and source of materials. It is potentially useful as a pioneer species for restoring woodland.

Known Hazards

None known

Botanical References

Range

Tropical Africa - Guinea Bissau to Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Congo, DR Congo, Uganda, Tanzania, Angola.

Habitat

Secondary forest, at forest edges or along rivers, lakesides and swamps, at elevations from sea-level up to 1,700 metres[].

Properties

Edibility Rating
Medicinal Rating
Other Uses Rating
Habit	Evergreen Tree
Height	15.00 m
Self-fertile	No
Cultivation Status	Wild

Cultivation Details

A dioecious species, both male and female forms need to be grown if fruit and seed are required[].

Edible Uses

Leaves - cooked and eaten as a vegetable, but mainly for its beneficial medicinal action on the digestive system[].

The twigs are sucked for the sweet sap in the bark[].

Medicinal

Throughout its distribution area, the latex from the stem bark is used as eye drops to treat filariasis, and is also applied to abscesses, leprous sores and glandular swellings[, ]. The bark latex is applied to snakebites[]. The latex from the stem bark, sometimes combined with banana or mixed in palm wine, is taken to treat stomach-ache, gonorrhoea, intestinal worms, coughing fits and food poisoning[].
The twig or root bark latex mixed with palm oil is applied as a lotion to treat measles[].

The bark is antidote, diuretic, emetic, febrifuge, parasiticide and purgative. A stem bark infusion is used to treat oedema[]. It is soaked in water or rum when taken as a purgative[]. Bark scrapings are applied as an enema to treat malaria and backache[]. A bark-decoction is given, either by draught or by enema, to young children who are not eating properly, who cry a lot and have distended stomachs due to constipation: the reaction is said to be immediate, soothing and purgative[]. A stem bark decoction is drunk as a remedy for Erythrophleum suaveolens poisoning[].
A stem bark infusion is rubbed on to rheumatic and painful limbs, painful kidney and to rid the body of fleass[, ]. The beaten stem bark is taken as a mouth wash to treat toothache and is applied as a poultice on swellings, abscesses, furuncles, buboes etc[, ]. A maceration of the stem bark is applied as a wash to treat hernia and urinary infections[].
The ash from the stem bark or root bark, mixed with palm oil, is applied to the hair to kill lice[].

The leaf sap. in water or rum, is commonly taken as a purgative and to treat fever[]. Young leaves are cut and cooked with fish and eaten to treat an enlarged spleen[]. The leaf sap, sometime swith banana or mixed in palm wine, is taken to treat stomach-ache, gonorrhoea, intestinal worms, coughing fits and food poisoning[]. To treat constipation or enlarged spleen in babies, the leaf sap is applied to the nipples of nursing mothers[, ].
The leaf sap is applied to wounds as a haemostatic[]. The leaves, crushed together with the stem bark of Cola ballayi, are applied to broken limbs as an embrocation to treat swellings[]. The leaves are applied hot as a poultice to limbs that are painful due to rheumatism or yaws, they are also used as a dressing on limbs that are becoming enlarged as symptoms of certain illnesses[].

A root decoction is drunk as an emetic[].

A trace of alkaloid has been detected in the leaves and bark[].

Agroforestry Uses:

The tree is considered a weed species of managed forestry in Sierra Leone[]. Given the trees natural habitat of secondary forest formations, this implies that it could be a suitable species for use as a pioneer when restoring native woodland[].

Other Uses

A bark extract is rubbed on the body as a mosquito repellent[].

The twigs are used as chew sticks[, ].

The stem bark contains saponins. It is beaten and used as a soap for washing clothes[, ].

The heartwood is pinkish; the sapwood yellowish white to colourless. The wood is soft to moderately hard and perishable. Of very limited use, though the stems are used traditionally as poles for making huts and sometimes also in carpentry. The wood is also sometimes used for plywood production[, ].
The wood is used as firewood and for charcoal making[].

Propagation

Seed -

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