Annona senegalensis

Annona senegalensis Pers.

Common names

Wild custard apple (English); mululo (Bemba); mpovya (Bemba, Kunda, Nyanja); chiyuta, mponjela, mposa, mpouya, mpovya, mtopa, mtantanyerere (Nyanja).

General description and distinguishing characteristics

A small, deciduous shrub or tree up to 8 m tall but usually much smaller. Bark grey, smooth, sometimes rough; branchlets densely hairy when young, losing their hairs as they mature. Leaves simple, alternate, 6-18.5 x 3-11.5 cm, obovate with a rounded apex. Leaf texture is papery to leathery, the upper surface of the leaf yellowy to cabbage green with sparse hairs; the lower leaf surface is paler, often with dense, silvery hairs and prominent, sometime red, venation. Leaf margins are entire. Petiole up to 20 mm long. Flowers solitary, occasionally in groups of 2 or 4, above the leaf axils. Flowers up to 3 cm in diameter on a flower stalk 10-20 mm long; petals greenish outside, cream-yellow inside, waxy and fleshy (October-December). Fruit orange or yellow when ripe, 2.5-5 x 2.5-3 cm, formed from many carpels with a distinctive lumpy appearance. (March-May).

Range and habitat

As its Latin name suggests, this is a pan-African species, extending from Senegal southwards. In the valley it is found in riverine fringe woodland and thicket and on the levees and sand deposits of rivers.