Publication
from Agroforestree Database: a tree reference and selection guide
version 4.0
by C. Orwa, A. Mutua, R. Kindt, R. Jamnadass and S. Anthony
Casimiroa edulis Llave & Lex.
Local Names: English (white zapote, white sapote, Mexican sapote, Mexican apple, casimiroa), Spanish (zapote blanco, matasano, chapote)
Family: Rutaceae
Botanic
Description
Casimiroa edulis is an
evergreen tree to 18 m tall, with spreading, often drooping branches
and a broad leafy crown. Bark light-grey, thick and warty.
Leaves palmately compound,
alternate, digitate; stipules absent; petiole 5-9.5 cm, finely
pubescent; leaflets sessile or subsessile, 3-7, elliptic, ovate or
broadly ovate, 4.5-12 cm long, 1-5 cm wide, apex acuminate, retuse or
occasionally rounded, base cuneate, margins subserrate, bright green,
glabrous or with scattered pubescence on the veins, vennation pinnate,
anastomising at the margins.
Inflorescence paniculate; flowers
odourless, small, regular, unisexual, 5-merous, hermaphrodite or
occasionally unisexual because of aborted stigmas. Sepals lacinate,
hirsute; petals greenish-yellow, 3-7 mm long; stamens 5, filaments
subulate, thickening at the base; ovary superior, 5-celled, stigma
sessile, lobate.
Fruit yellowish-green, spherical or ovoid
drupe, irregular and knobby, with rough, pitted skin, often with gritty
particles in the flesh, 6-10 cm in diameter, smooth, pulp sweet.
Seeds oval and wedged, usually 1-6/fruit, 18-23 mm long.
The woolly-leaved white sapote, often called C. tetrameria may be only a variant of C. edulis. It usually has 5 leaflets, larger and thicker than those of C. edulis and velvety-white on the underside, and all the parts of the flowers are in 4's.
A
number of varieties are described some of these may actually be chance
hybrids. Some have been named and propagated: 'Blumenthal', 'Chapman',
'Coleman', 'Dade', 'Flournoy', 'Galloway', 'Gillespie', 'Golden' or
'Max Golden', 'Johnston's Golden', 'Harvey', 'Lenz', 'Lomita',
'Maechtlen', 'Maltby' or 'Nancy Maltby', 'Nies', 'Page', 'Parroquia',
'Pike', 'Sarah Jones', 'Suebelle', or 'Hubbell', 'Walton', 'Whatley',
'Wilson', 'Wood', 'Yellow'.
Ecology
The white sapote
occurs in subtropical deciduous woodlands and low forests. It occurs
both wild and cultivated in central Mexico but is planted in Guatemala,
El Salvador, Costa Rica, South America, the Bahamas, the West Indies,
parts of the Mediterranean region, India, Philippines. It is fairly
drought tolerant.
Biophysical
Limits
Altitude: 1 200-2 400 m
Mean annual temperature: 18 deg C
Soil type: Well drained sandy loam or even on clay, decomposed granite soil, oolitic limestone.
Documented
Species Distribution
Native: Bahamas, Costa Rica, Guatemala, India, Israel, Kenya, Mexico, New
Zealand, Nicaragua, Philippines, South Africa, United States of America
Exotic:
Products
Food: The fruit is edible and
is used in Mexico and El Salvador as dessert. The flavour is sweet with
a hint or more of bitterness and sometimes distinctly resinous.
Timber: The wood is yellow,
fine-grained, compact, moderately dense and heavy, medium strong and
resistant, but not durable for long. It is occasionally employed in
carpentry and for domestic furniture in Central America.
Poison: The seed is said to be
fatally toxic if eaten raw by humans or animals. Extractions from the
kernels are an attractive and lethal bait for American cockroaches,
having the advantage of killing on the spot rather than at some
distance after ingestion of the poison.
Medicine: For many years,
extracts from the leaves, bark, and especially the seeds have been
employed in Mexico as sedatives, soporifics and tranquilizers. The
fruit is considered medicinal, the ancient Nahuatl name for the fruits
"cochiztzapotl" is translated "sleepy sapote" or "sleep-producing
sapote". Eating the fruit produces drowsiness and it is widely claimed
in Mexico and Central America that consumption of the fruit relieves
the pains of arthritis and rheumatism. The fruit is also reportedly
vermifugal. The narcotic property of the seeds was first identified as
an alkaloid by Dr. Jesus Sanchez of Mexico in his thesis, 'Breve
estudio sobre la almendra del zapote blanco' in 1893 many years later
the alkaloidal glycoside casimirin was related with the soporific
activity. Since then a number of other substances especially alkaloids
have been identified e.g. casimiroine, casimiroedine, the main seed
alkaloid, casimiroedine, represents 0.143% content. Crushed and roasted
seeds are effective in healing putrid sores. In Costa Rica, the leaf
decoction is taken as a treatment for diabetes. Vasodepressive activity
of the white sapote is attributed to Na-dimethy-1-histamine, formerly
found in nature only in the sponge, Geodia gigas.
Other products:
Also present are coumarins, flavonoids, and limonoids, including
zapoterin, zapotin, zapotinin, casimirolid, deacetylnomilin, and
7-a-obacunol. Leaves and twigs yield isoplimpinellin (diuretic) and
n-hentriacontane.
Services
Shade or shelter: They are planted as shade for coffee plantations in Central America.
Ornamental: White sapote trees often are grown strictly as ornamentals in California.
Tree
Management
In
California, the young trees are cut back to 0.9 m when planted out, in
order to encourage low-branching. As the branches elongate, some
pruning is done to induce lateral growth. Fertilizer formulas should
vary with the nature of the soil, but, in general, procedures suitable
for citrus trees apply to the white sapote. Many white sapote trees
have received little or no care and yet have been long-lived. White
sapote are fairly drought-resistant. The fruits must be handled with
care even when unripe as they bruise so easily and any bruised skin
will blacken and the flesh beneath turns bitter. Mature fruits must be
clipped from the branches leaving a short piece of stem attached. This
stub will fall off naturally when the fruits become eating-ripe. If
plucked by hand, the fruits will separate from the stem if given a
slight twist but they will soon show a soft bruised spot at the
stem-end which quickly spreads over much of the fruit, becoming watery
and decayed. If picked just a few days before fully ripe and ready to
fall, the fruits turn soft quickly but they can be picked several weeks
in advance of the falling stage and most will develop full flavor.
'Pike', however, if picked a month early, will take 2 weeks to ripen
and will be substandard in flavor. Fruits that have ripened on hand
will keep in good condition in the home refrigerator for at least 2
weeks. Fruits from commercial orchards are wrapped individually to
retard full ripening, packed in wooden boxes, and well-padded for
transportation under refrigeration.
The white sapote occurs in
subtropical deciduous woodlands and low forests. It occurs both wild
and cultivated in central Mexico but is planted in Guatemala, El
Salvador, Costa Rica, South America, the Bahamas, the West Indies,
parts of the Mediterranean region, India, Philippines. It is fairly
drought tolerant.
White sapotes are commonly grown from seeds
and seedlings usually begin to bear in 7-8 years. Grafting is a common
practice in California and Florida in midsummer. Seedlings of 'Pike',
being vigorous growers, are preferred as rootstock. Shield-budding and
side-grafting in spring onto stocks up to 3/4 in (2 cm) thick give good
results. Cleft grafts and slot grafts are made on larger rootstocks and
when topworking mature trees. Grafted trees start bearing in 3-4 years.
Commercial growers in New Zealand have had success with air-layers.
Cuttings are very difficult to root.
Further
Reading
FAO. 1986. Some medicinal plants of Africa and Latin America. FAO Forestry Paper. 67. Rome.
http://www. purdue newcrop index site
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