Croton gratissimus

Botanical Description

Croton gratissimus is a deciduous multi-stemmed shrub up to 3 metres tall, or a slender tree with a 'V'-shaped crown; it can grow up to 20 metres tall, but only up to 10 metres in the south of its range[ 295 Title PlantZAfrica.com Publication Author Website http://www.plantzafrica.com Publisher Year 0 ISBN Description An excellent site giving detailed descriptions and uses of many S. African plants. ]. The tree is harvested from the wild for local use as a medicine, food flavouring and source of essential oil and wood. It has a scaly bark and silvery leaves, rusty-scaly below, and has an attractive appearance. It is often planted in towns and villages[ 332 Title The Useful Plants of West Tropical Africa. Publication Author Burkil. H. M. Publisher Royal Botanic Gardens; Kew. Year 1985 - 2004 ISBN Description Brief descriptions and details of the uses of over 4,000 plants. A superb, if terse, resource, it is also available electronically on the Web - see http://www.aluka.org/ ]. Croton gratissimus has a very wide distribution, large population, is not currently experiencing any major threats and no significant future threats have been identified.The plant is classified as 'Least Concern' in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species(2019)[ 338 Title IUCN Red List of Threatened Species Publication Author Website http://www.iucnredlist.org/ Publisher Year 0 ISBN Description A list of plants under threat and facing possible extinction, usually with brief details of the threats and information on habitat. ].