''Grewia villosa'' is a shrub, often scrambling and hardly exceeding 4 m in height. Leaves are fairly large, serrated and heart-shaped. It grows naturally, mainly in dry habitats. It is common in most of the semi-arid parts of Eastern Africa but may now be rare in parts of its natural distribution. It can be seen in
Ein Gedi
Ein Gedi ( he, עֵין גֶּדִי, ), also spelled En Gedi, meaning "spring of the goat, kid", is an oasis, an Archaeological site, archeological site and a nature reserve in Israel, located west of the Dead Sea, near Masada and the Qu ...
oasis in
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
, and in
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the ...
, where it is common. Its ripe copper-coloured fruits are eaten in East Africa.
Uses
The fruit of the ''Grewia villosa'' were eaten both while immature and green and also once they had ripened and hardened to a dark, reddish-brown. The bark was stripped off and crushed in water or chewed to a pulp which was used to wash the body as well as to clean the hair and disinfect the scalp
See also
*
List of Southern African indigenous trees
This is a list of Southern African trees, shrubs, suffrutices, geoxyles and lianes, and is intended to cover Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The notion of 'indigenous' is of ...
References
*Maundu, P. M. ; Ngugi, G. W. ; Kabuye, C. H. S., 1999. Traditional food plants of Kenya. Kenya Resource Centre for Indigenous Knowledge, National Museums of Kenya, 270 pages
External links
Grewia villosa, The Jerusalem botanic gardensGrewia villosa, Israel wild flowers
Grewia, villosa
Fruits originating in Africa
Flora of the Indian subcontinent
Flora of Oman
Trees of Western Asia
Plants described in 1803
{{Grewioideae-stub