Tectona grandis  

Tectona grandis L. f.

Family : Verbenaceae

Common Name : തേക്ക് (Mal)

: सगुन (Hin)

: Teak (Eng)

IUCN Status : Endangered (EN) ↓

A very popular timber tree, teak is native to India and Burma to Java. It is a deciduous tree attaining a very large size. However, in cities it might be seen on the roadside as a medium sized tree with large leaves. Teak is considered a good quality wood for furniture. Leaves of the tree are opposite, 30-60 cm long and 15-30 cm broad. The flowers come in large numbers in lax clusters at the end of branches. They are white and rather small - about 6 mm across. The fruit is about 15 mm across, spongy, enclosed in the persistent calyx. Flowers appear in monsoon, fruit ripens in winter. From November to January, the tree is leafless.

Deciduous trees, to 30 m high, bark 10-20 mm thick, yellowish-brown, rough; branchlets 5-10 mm thick, 4-angled, puberulous. Leaves simple, opposite, 30-60 x 15-30 cm, ovate, obovate, apex acute or obtuse, base attenuate, margin entire, wavy, glabrous above and pubescent below with minute red glands; lateral nerves 8-10 pairs, pinnate, prominent, raised beneath, puberulent beneath, intercostae scalariform, prominent; petiole 10-50 mm long, stout, tomentose. Flowers bisexual, white, 7 mm across, in terminal cymose panicles, 10-30 cm across, puberulous. Calyx 5 mm long, campanulate, lobes 5-6, subequal, ovate, tomentose. Corolla white, 6 mm long, lobes 5-6, oblong, spreading. Stamens 5-6, equal, erect, inserted at the throat, exserted; filaments 3 mm. Ovary globose, densely hairy, 4-celled, 1 ovule in each cell; style slender, 4 mm; stigma linearly bifid. Fruit a drupe, 1.5-2 cm across, globose, brown, densely floccose hairy, covered by the inflated calyx, epicarp spongy, endocarp stony; seeds 1-4, oblong.

Use: Used to make furnitures and also used as medicinal plant

Distribution : South and South East Asia, introduced and cultivated elsewhere

Flowering & Fruiting : May-January