Trees of Cloudbridge

Cinchona pubescens (Cinchona, quinine tree)

Description: Trees usually 4-10 m tall.

Natural history: C. pubescens can be propagated from seeds or cuttings of ripe wood.

Distribution: All Cinchona species are indigenous to the eastern slopes of the Amazonian area of the Andes growing at elevations between 1,500 to 3,000 ft (457-914 m) from Colombia to Bolivia. C. pubescens is native from Costa Rica to Venezuela and Bolivia (Wagner et al. 1999). The native range is located in South America on both sides of the equator in mountainous highlands and tropical rain forest regions with annual rainfalls ranging from about 40 in (102 cm) upwards to over 80 in (203 cm). It has been cultivated in various tropical regions of the world mainly for use in the production of quinine, a medicine used to treat malaria, which is obtained from the root and bark of the tree.

How to recognize:

Uses: One of the more well-known trees because of its efficacy in the treatment of malaria. The family, Rubaceae, includes the coffee tree. Most of the Cinchona today is used for food preparation in tonic waters and bitter additives, in the production of Quinidine, used for cardiac problems, and in the production of quinine, for use in natural remedies and because some malaria strains have grown resistant to synthetic quinine.

Sources and Links:
http://www.hear.org/starr/hiplants/reports/html/cinchona_pubescens.htm

Scientific Information:

Division: Magnoliophyta (Flowering plants)

Class: Magnoliopsida (Dicots)

Order:

Family: Rubaceae

Species: Cinchona pubescens

Photo Identification Guide: Cinchona pubescens (Cinchona, quinine tree)

Leaves. Leaves are green but one typically finds a few red leaves among the green. Leaves broadly elliptic-ovate or sometimes sub-orbicular, 10-20 cm long, 7-10.5 cm wide, upper surface puberulent, sometimes primarily along veins, or glabrate, lateral veins usually 9-11 pairs, margins entire, apex rounded, base broadly to narrowly cuneate, petioles 1.5-4.5 cm long, stipules ovate, caducous. Source: Hear.

Flowers. . Flowers numerous in panicles up to 20 cm long or slightly longer; calyx ca. 1 mm long, densely appressed pubescent, the teeth deltate; corolla pink (or red outside Hawai'i), appressed pubescent, the tube 10-12 mm long, the lobes ca. 4-5 mm long, villous within. Source: Hear.

Fruit and Seeds. Seeds ca. 2 mm long, with a broad ciliate wing. Seeds of C. pubescens are surrounded by a papery like wing and are wind dispersed. Source: Hear.

Trunk. Trunk is smooth.

Saplings.

Other.

Cloudbridge: Bridging a Costa Rican cloud forest

Division:	Magnoliophyta (Flowering plants)
Class:	Magnoliopsida (Dicots)
Order:
Family:	Rubaceae
Species:	Cinchona pubescens