木薯胶 mu shu jiao

Manihot carthaginensis (Jacquin) Müller Argoviensis subsp. glaziovii (Müller Argoviensis) Allem.

Trees or shrubs, up to 14 m tall; bark strongly peeling glossy brown, latex abundant; branches herbaceous, glabrous. Stipules lanceolate, 4-6 mm, gray-green, laciniate; petiole 4-25 cm, with many longitudinal grooves, peltate, inserted at least 5 mm from margin; leaf blade palmately 3-7-lobed, 10-30 × 15-25 cm, papery or membranous, lobes obovate, elliptic, rhomboid, or spatulate, 7-10 × 3.5-7 cm, margins entire, apex acute to shortly acuminate. Panicles 7-9 cm; bracts lanceolate, ca. 2.5 mm. Male flowers: calyx 9-11 mm, 5-lobed, lobes oblong, ca. 5 × 2-3 mm, apex obtuse, glabrous inside; disk shallowly cupular, 10-lobed, glabrous; anthers oblong, ca. 2.5 mm. Female flowers: calyx 10-11 mm, 5-lobed; ovary ellipsoidal, glabrous. Capsules subglobose or globose, ca. 2 cm in diam., warty, wingless, rugose. Seeds depressed-ovoid, ca. 1.5 cm, with shallow brown spot-stripes. Fl. Sep-Oct, fr. Nov-Dec.

Cultivated. S Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan [native to Brazil; widely cultivated in tropical Africa, Asia, and elsewhere].

Manihot glaziovii, the Ceará rubber tree, is grown as a source of rubber. It has become naturalized in some parts of the world and is considered to be a potentially invasive weed.