Vitex obovata

Vitex obovata, commonly the hairy fingerleaf or the Kei fingerleaf, is a small leafy, tree commonly reaching 3 m to 4 m, occasionally 9 m (SA tree List No. 661).

The bark is grey or brown, rough and fissured. The young stems are hairy.

The flowers have small white or mauve bell-shaped corollas positioned in notable calyx cups. The flowers grow during spring in dense clusters from the upper leaf axils on young stems.

The fruit is a small, obovoid black drupe with a sharp tip, the left-over of the style of the flower. The fruits are partly enclosed in the calyx remains.

The distribution is along the South African east coast from the Eastern Cape to KwaZulu-Natal and inland in Mpumalanga, Limpopo and Gauteng, as well as in some neighbouring countries.

The habitat is varied, including coastal scrub, riverine bush, wooded hillsides, grassland and rocky slopes. The species is not considered to be threatened in its habitat early in the twenty first century (Coates Palgrave, 2002; Schmidt, et al, 2002; http://redlist.sanbi.org).