Gymnosporia heterophylla (Common Spike-thorn) is a small, hardy, deciduous African tree up to 5m tall, occurring in rocky places with a wide distribution from Ethiopia

Ethiopia

Ethiopia , officially known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million inhabitants, and the tenth-largest by area, occupying 1,100,000 km2...

, the Sudan

Sudan

Sudan , officially the Republic of the Sudan , is a country in North Africa, sometimes considered part of the Middle East politically. It is bordered by Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the northeast, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the east, South Sudan to the south, the Central African Republic to the...

 and the Congo

Congo Basin

The Congo Basin is the sedimentary basin that is the drainage of the Congo River of west equatorial Africa. The basin begins in the highlands of the East African Rift system with input from the Chambeshi River, the Uele and Ubangi Rivers in the upper reaches and the Lualaba River draining wetlands...

, south to the Cape Province

Cape Province

The Province of the Cape of Good Hope was a province in the Union of South Africa and subsequently the Republic of South Africa...

 and west to Angola

Angola

Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...

 and Namibia

Namibia

Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia , is a country in southern Africa whose western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and east. It gained independence from South Africa on 21 March...

, as well as the neighbouring islands of Madagascar

Madagascar

The Republic of Madagascar is an island country located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa...

 and Saint Helena

Saint Helena

Saint Helena , named after St Helena of Constantinople, is an island of volcanic origin in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is part of the British overseas territory of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha which also includes Ascension Island and the islands of Tristan da Cunha...

, with a closely related species from Mauritius

Mauritius

Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...

.

It has a straggly, but rigid habit and is armed with sharp straight thorns

Thorns, spines, and prickles

In botanical morphology, thorns, spines, and prickles are hard structures with sharp, or at least pointed, ends. In spite of this common feature, they differ in their growth and development on the plant; they are modified versions of different plant organs, stems, stipules, leaf veins, or hairs...

 up to 100mm long, which are modified branches. Bark on the mature trunk is grey-brown and deeply fissured. Clusters of white flowers are produced in profusion in spring and are borne on thicker twigs and branches. The flowers have a fetid, faecal smell and attract large numbers of pollinating insects, particularly carrion-loving flies such as members of the family Calliphoridae. The tree has a close relationship with a number of cicada

Cicada

A cicada is an insect of the order Hemiptera, suborder Auchenorrhyncha , in the superfamily Cicadoidea, with large eyes wide apart on the head and usually transparent, well-veined wings. There are about 2,500 species of cicada around the world, and many of them remain unclassified...

 species, such as Platypleura divisa

Platypleura divisa

Platypleura divisa , is an African cicada first described by Ernst Friedrich Germar, entomologist and professor of mineralogy at Halle, who also studied beetles.The genus Platypleura occurs widely across Africa and southern Asia...

, P. mijburghi and P. maytenophila.

The specific name "heterophylla" means "variable leaves" and if the list of past synonyms is examined, it affords an interesting insight into the minds of botanists since 1753 when Linnaeus decided that the leaves reminded him of boxwood

Buxus

Buxus is a genus of about 70 species in the family Buxaceae. Common names include box or boxwood ....

 and named it Celastrus buxifolius. Since then it has been named ellipticus, heterophyllus, spathephyllus, empleurifolius, rhombifolius, parvifolius and buxifolioides - it would seem that the epithet heterophylla is appropriate.

It makes a very effective, fast-growing security hedge. The wood is hard and durable, suitable for carving, though large pieces are not often available.

Sources

• Trees and Shrubs of the Witwatersrand - Tree Society (Witwatersrand University Press, 1969)
• Trees and Shrubs of Mpumalanga
  Mpumalanga
  Mpumalanga , is a province of South Africa. The name means east or literally "the place where the sun rises" in Swazi, Xhosa, Ndebele and Zulu. Mpumalanga lies in eastern South Africa, north of KwaZulu-Natal and bordering Swaziland and Mozambique. It constitutes 6.5% of South Africa's land area...
  
   and Kruger National Park
  Kruger National Park
  Kruger National Park is one of the largest game reserves in Africa. It covers and extends from north to south and from east to west.To the west and south of the Kruger National Park are the two South African provinces of Limpopo and Mpumalanga. In the north is Zimbabwe, and to the east is...
  
  - Schmidt et al. (Jacana Press, 2002)