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Zanha africana
Also called Muchenya, Velvet Fruited Zanha
Zanha africana is a shrub or small tree from southern and eastern Africa, valued locally for hard timber and herbal medicine. It is a woodland tree rather than a garden or houseplant, so care notes here describe its natural conditions.
Zanha africana, commonly known as the velvet-fruited zanha in English and as mkalya or mkwanga in Swahili, is a species of plant in the family Sapindaceae that is native to Africa. It is used locally for timber and herbal medicine.
Zanha africana is native to Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. It grows in open woodlands, including those on granite ridges or kopjes, and in riparian forests at altitudes of 600–1,550 m (1,970–5,090 ft).
The wood of Zanha africana is hard, durable, and somewhat resistant to attacks by wood-eating insects. Though it is not considered commercially valuable as timber, it is used locally for construction, agricultural implements, firewood, furniture, mine props, shipbuilding, turnery, and railway sleepers. The fruits are eaten by humans, reportedly tasting similar to apricots, but the seeds are believed to be poisonous and eating large quantities of the fruit may cause diarrhoea. Several parts of the plant contain saponins and may be used as substitutes for soap. The bark, leaves, and roots of Z. africana are widely used as herbal medicine for a variety of ailments, including aches and pains, convulsions, fevers, fungal infections, headaches, hypertension, intestinal parasites, nausea, respiratory problems, and sexually transmitted infections.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Zanha africana by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
