Faidherbia albida
Encyclopedia
Faidherbia albida is a species of Faidherbia
native to Africa
and the Middle East
, formerly widely included in the genus Acacia
. It has also been introduced to India
and Pakistan
. Common names for it include Apple-ring Acacia, Ana Tree and Winter Thorn.
It is a thorny tree
growing up to 6–30 m tall and 2 m in trunk diameter. Its deep-penetrating tap root makes it highly resistant to drought. The bark is grey, and fissured when old. There are 11000 seeds/kg. Faidherbia albida is not listed as being a threatened species
.
It grows in areas with 250-600 mm/yr of rain.
Faiderbia albida is known in the Bambara language
as balanzan, and is the official tree of the city of Segou
, on the Niger River
in central Mali
. According to legend, Segou is home to 4,444 balanzan trees, plus one mysterious "missing tree" the location of which cannot be identified.
The northernmost natural populations are found in relict
groves in Israel
(in the Shimron
nature reserve, near the communal settlement of Timrat
). All of the trees in a given grove are genetically identical and seem to have multiplied by vegetative reproduction
only, for thousands of years.
for raising bee
s, since its flowers provide bee forage
at the close of the rainy season, when most other local plants do not.
The seed pods are important for raising livestock
, are used as camel
fodder
in Nigeria
, and are relished by elephant, antelope, buffalo, baboons and various browsers and grazers, though strangely ignored by warthog and zebra.
The wood is used for canoes, mortars, and pestles and the bark is pounded in Nigeria and used as a packing material on pack animals. The wood has a density of about 560 kg/m³ at a water content of 12%. The energy value of the wood as fuel is 19.741 kJ/kg.
Ashes of the wood are used in making soap and as a depilatory and tanning agent for hides. VITA (1977) says the wood is used for carving; the thorny branches useful for a natural barbed fence. Pods and foliage are highly regarded as livestock fodder. Some 90% of Senegalese farmers interviewed by Felker (1981) collected, stored, and rationed Acacia alba pods to livestock. Rhodesians use the pods to stupefy fish. Humans eat the boiled seeds in times of scarcity in Rhodesia."
It is also used for nitrogen fixation
, erosion control
for crops, for food, drink and medicine. Unlike most other trees, it sheds its leaves in the rainy season; for this reason, it is highly valued in agroforestry
as it can grow among field crops without shading them. It contains the psychoactive chemical compound dimethyltryptamine
in its leaves.The leaves from this legume tree are high in nitrogen, and can double yields in maize crops, etc., when added to the soil. There is a program planned to translplant the tree across Adrica to boost production..
animals.
Reported to serve as an emetic in fevers (Maasai), taken for diarrhea in Tanganyika. Also used for colds, diarrhea, hemorrhage, and ophthalmia in West Africa. The bark of the Ana tree is a folk remedy for diarrhea among several tribes. On the Ivory Coast it is used for leprosy. The bark decoction curtails nausea. A liniment, made by steeping the bark, is used for bathing and massage in pneumonia.
Faidherbia
Faidherbia is a genus of flowering plants in the legume family, Fabaceae. It belongs to the sub family Mimosoideae....
native to Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
and the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
, formerly widely included in the genus Acacia
Acacia
Acacia is a genus of shrubs and trees belonging to the subfamily Mimosoideae of the family Fabaceae, first described in Africa by the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus in 1773. Many non-Australian species tend to be thorny, whereas the majority of Australian acacias are not...
. It has also been introduced to India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
and Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
. Common names for it include Apple-ring Acacia, Ana Tree and Winter Thorn.
It is a thorny tree
Tree
A tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...
growing up to 6–30 m tall and 2 m in trunk diameter. Its deep-penetrating tap root makes it highly resistant to drought. The bark is grey, and fissured when old. There are 11000 seeds/kg. Faidherbia albida is not listed as being a threatened species
Threatened species
Threatened species are any speciesg animals, plants, fungi, etc.) which are vulnerable to endangerment in the near future.The World Conservation Union is the foremost authority on threatened species, and treats threatened species not as a single category, but as a group of three categories,...
.
It grows in areas with 250-600 mm/yr of rain.
Faiderbia albida is known in the Bambara language
Bambara language
Bambara, more correctly known as Bamanankan , its designation in the language itself , is a language spoken in Mali by as many as six million people...
as balanzan, and is the official tree of the city of Segou
Ségou
Ségou is a city in south-central Mali, lying northeast of Bamako on the River Niger, in the region of Ségou. It was founded by the Bozo people, on a site about from the present town...
, on the Niger River
Niger River
The Niger River is the principal river of western Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in southeastern Guinea...
in central Mali
Mali
Mali , officially the Republic of Mali , is a landlocked country in Western Africa. Mali borders Algeria on the north, Niger on the east, Burkina Faso and the Côte d'Ivoire on the south, Guinea on the south-west, and Senegal and Mauritania on the west. Its size is just over 1,240,000 km² with...
. According to legend, Segou is home to 4,444 balanzan trees, plus one mysterious "missing tree" the location of which cannot be identified.
The northernmost natural populations are found in relict
Relict
A relict is a surviving remnant of a natural phenomenon.* In biology a relict is an organism that at an earlier time was abundant in a large area but now occurs at only one or a few small areas....
groves in Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
(in the Shimron
Shimron
Shimron was a major city in the north of the Land of Israel, in antiquity. Shimron is mentioned in the bible by this name, and in other period sources as Shim'on. The city is identified with the tell called Tel Samunia in Arabic. The tel rises 60 meters above its surroundings, north-east of moshav...
nature reserve, near the communal settlement of Timrat
Timrat
Timrat is a communal settlement in northern Israel. Located in the Lower Galilee near Nahalal, it falls under the jurisdiction of Jezreel Valley Regional Council...
). All of the trees in a given grove are genetically identical and seem to have multiplied by vegetative reproduction
Vegetative reproduction
Vegetative reproduction is a form of asexual reproduction in plants. It is a process by which new individuals arise without production of seeds or spores...
only, for thousands of years.
Cultivation and uses
Faidherbia albida is important in the SahelSahel
The Sahel is the ecoclimatic and biogeographic zone of transition between the Sahara desert in the North and the Sudanian Savannas in the south.It stretches across the North African continent between the Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea....
for raising bee
Bee
Bees are flying insects closely related to wasps and ants, and are known for their role in pollination and for producing honey and beeswax. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamily Apoidea, presently classified by the unranked taxon name Anthophila...
s, since its flowers provide bee forage
Forage (honeybee)
For bees, their forage or food supply consists of nectar and pollen from blooming plants within flight range. The forage sources for honey bees are an important consideration for beekeepers. In order to determine where to locate hives for maximum honey production and brood one must consider the...
at the close of the rainy season, when most other local plants do not.
The seed pods are important for raising livestock
Livestock
Livestock refers to one or more domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to produce commodities such as food, fiber and labor. The term "livestock" as used in this article does not include poultry or farmed fish; however the inclusion of these, especially poultry, within the meaning...
, are used as camel
Camel
A camel is an even-toed ungulate within the genus Camelus, bearing distinctive fatty deposits known as humps on its back. There are two species of camels: the dromedary or Arabian camel has a single hump, and the bactrian has two humps. Dromedaries are native to the dry desert areas of West Asia,...
fodder
Fodder
Fodder or animal feed is any agricultural foodstuff used specifically to feed domesticated livestock such as cattle, goats, sheep, horses, chickens and pigs. Most animal feed is from plants but some is of animal origin...
in Nigeria
Nigeria
Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
, and are relished by elephant, antelope, buffalo, baboons and various browsers and grazers, though strangely ignored by warthog and zebra.
The wood is used for canoes, mortars, and pestles and the bark is pounded in Nigeria and used as a packing material on pack animals. The wood has a density of about 560 kg/m³ at a water content of 12%. The energy value of the wood as fuel is 19.741 kJ/kg.
Ashes of the wood are used in making soap and as a depilatory and tanning agent for hides. VITA (1977) says the wood is used for carving; the thorny branches useful for a natural barbed fence. Pods and foliage are highly regarded as livestock fodder. Some 90% of Senegalese farmers interviewed by Felker (1981) collected, stored, and rationed Acacia alba pods to livestock. Rhodesians use the pods to stupefy fish. Humans eat the boiled seeds in times of scarcity in Rhodesia."
It is also used for nitrogen fixation
Nitrogen fixation
Nitrogen fixation is the natural process, either biological or abiotic, by which nitrogen in the atmosphere is converted into ammonia . This process is essential for life because fixed nitrogen is required to biosynthesize the basic building blocks of life, e.g., nucleotides for DNA and RNA and...
, erosion control
Erosion control
Erosion control is the practice of preventing or controlling wind or water erosion in agriculture, land development and construction. Effective erosion controls are important techniques in preventing water pollution and soil loss.-Introduction:...
for crops, for food, drink and medicine. Unlike most other trees, it sheds its leaves in the rainy season; for this reason, it is highly valued in agroforestry
Agroforestry
Agroforestry is an integrated approach of using the interactive benefits from combining trees and shrubs with crops and/or livestock.It combines agricultural and forestry technologies to create more diverse, productive, profitable, healthy and sustainable land-use systems.-Definitions:According to...
as it can grow among field crops without shading them. It contains the psychoactive chemical compound dimethyltryptamine
Dimethyltryptamine
N,N-Dimethyltryptamine is a naturally occurring psychedelic compound of the tryptamine family. DMT is found in several plants, and also in trace amounts in humans and other mammals, where it is originally derived from the essential amino acid tryptophan, and ultimately produced by the enzyme INMT...
in its leaves.The leaves from this legume tree are high in nitrogen, and can double yields in maize crops, etc., when added to the soil. There is a program planned to translplant the tree across Adrica to boost production..
Medicinal uses
The extract is used to treat ocular infections in farmFarm
A farm is an area of land, or, for aquaculture, lake, river or sea, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing food , fibres and, increasingly, fuel. It is the basic production facility in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single...
animals.
Reported to serve as an emetic in fevers (Maasai), taken for diarrhea in Tanganyika. Also used for colds, diarrhea, hemorrhage, and ophthalmia in West Africa. The bark of the Ana tree is a folk remedy for diarrhea among several tribes. On the Ivory Coast it is used for leprosy. The bark decoction curtails nausea. A liniment, made by steeping the bark, is used for bathing and massage in pneumonia.
Regional Names
| Language | Name |
| Afrikaans | Ana, ana-boom |
| Arabic (Chad) | Harraz |
| Arabic (Sudan) | Haraz, hiraz |
| Bambara (Bamanankan) Bambara language Bambara, more correctly known as Bamanankan , its designation in the language itself , is a language spoken in Mali by as many as six million people... |
Balansan, balasa |
| Djerma | Gao |
| English | Apple-ring acacia, winterthorn |
| French | Kad, cadde |
| Fula (Fulfulde; Pulaar) Fula language The Fula or Fulani language is a language of West Africa. It is spoken as a first language by the and related groups from Senegambia and Guinea to Cameroon and Sudan... |
Cayki, caski |
| Hausa Hausa language Hausa is the Chadic language with the largest number of speakers, spoken as a first language by about 25 million people, and as a second language by about 18 million more, an approximate total of 43 million people... |
Gao |
| Hebrew | שיטה מלבינה (sheeta malbina) |
| Kuunda | Musangu |
| Maasai | Ol-erai |
| Moore | Zanga, zaaga |
| Somali | Garbi |
| Tabwa | Muchese |
| Tamachek | athes, ahtes, ates |
| Tonga | Musangu, muunga |
| Turkana | Edurukoit |
| Wolof Wolof language Wolof is a language spoken in Senegal, The Gambia, and Mauritania, and is the native language of the Wolof people. Like the neighbouring languages Serer and Fula, it belongs to the Atlantic branch of the Niger–Congo language family... |
Kad |