Botany
· Large umbraculiform tree growing over 20 meters high, providing shade and also lending to popularity for use in carving, wood basins and bowls.
· Bark is rough and furrowed.
· Branches, widespread.
· Leaves, bipinnate and hairy underneath.
· Flowers, borne in peduncles, clusters of axillary, pink-green.
· Fruits: pods are dark, fleshy , 15-20 cm long, 2 cm wide, with a pulpy sweet mesocarp.

Constituents
· Saponin-lik e alkaloid pithecolobin has been isolated from the bark and the seed.
· Alkaloids are said to be abundant in the bark, stems, leaves, and seeds.
· Leaves and stems have saponin and tannin; gum from the trunk.

Distribution
Throughout the Philippines in waste places along roads and trails in fallow, rice paddies, etc.

Parts utilized:
· Entire plant.
· Collect from May to October.
· Rinse and sun-dry.

Properties
Slightly acidic tasting, cooling.
Antipyretic, stomachic, astringent and antidermatoses.

Folkloric uses
· Acute bacillary dysentery, enteritis, diarrhea: use 15 to 30 gms dried material in decoction.
· Also for colds, sore throat, headache.
· A decoction of the inner bark or fresh cambium and leaves is used to treat diarrhea.
· Anaphylactic dermatitis, eczema, skin pruritus: use decoction of fresh material and apply as external wash.
· Latex used as gum arabic for gluing.
· Other uses / studies
· Seasonally copious pods with sweet pulp that can be grounded and converted to fodder and alcohol as an energy source. It is also an important honey plant like most mimosaceous trees.
· Studies have suggested antimycobacterial antimicrobial activity in the crude extracts of acacia.

Availability
Wild-crafted.