A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife
Project Noah Nature School
Pittosporum bicolor
About 22mm long; flesh is very red, segmented, viscid, 'wings' are the two halves of the fruit covering opened up to 90 degrees. The tree was about 6 metres tall; leaves opposite, pointy and long.
In very tall eucalyptus rain forest.
This is an endemic to our area and is also called 'Tallow-wood'. It is closely related to the common 'Sweet pittosporum' - Pittosporum undulatum which has the common name of 'Australian cheesewood'. The two species have been known to hybridise. Distribution in Australia http://bie.ala.org.au/species/Tallow-woo... The same species in a different location showing the whole plant http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/171... Thanks to Jason Alexander for finding this ID
..although there's something tangled up with the Flickr link ID but I'll sort it out. (Cheesewood is not P.bicolor on Wiki) - thanks again.
Possibly Pittosporum revolutum - apparently indigenous peoples used to eat it. Going back for more pics of the plant...
I thought about it Sergio... but if it's they only untouched fruit in a forest full of hungry creatures would you? 8-)
Spotted on May 4, 2013
Submitted on May 6, 2013
