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''Gardenia thunbergia'' is a sturdy large shrub or small tree endemic to the Southern and Eastern regions of South Africa and neighbouring territories such as Swaziland. It grows largely in forest or on forest margins, occurring in the Eastern Cape, Natal and Transkei in South Africa. It is densely twiggy and rigid with smooth light-grey bark, and is horticulturally valuable, being easy to grow as a strong hedge, but more usually as a specimen plant, striking in appearance and long-lived. The abundant and extremely fragrant flowers are about 70mm in diameter with long tubes only accessible to the proboscises of nocturnal hawkmoths. The leaves are smooth, shiny, whorled and entire, and clustered at the ends of branchlets. The fruit is oval, hard, woody and fibrous, about 80mm long and about 40mm in diameter, light-grey with small raised white spots and if not eaten by large browsers or elephant, will remain on the tree for years. Its common names include Forest Gardenia, Mutarara (in the Shona language),〔Farmer, Nancy: ''A Girl named Disaster''. Puffin Books, 1996〕 Tree Gardenia, White Gardenia and Wild Gardenia. In Afrikaans it is variously known as Buffelsbol ("buffalo ball''), Stompdoring ("blunt thorn"), or Wildekatjiepiering ("wild gardenia"). The tree is a food plant for the larvae of some species of hawk moths such as the Oriental Bee Hawk moth, ''Cephonodes hylas''. ''Gardenia thunbergia'' was first introduced to Kew as early as 1773. It belongs to the very large family of ''Rubiaceae'', which includes plants such as coffee (''Coffea arabica''), quinine (''Cinchona'') and numerous ornamental trees and shrubs with showy flowers. It is considered a means of repelling witchcraft in Karanga traditional medicine.〔Shoko, Tabona: "Karanga Traditional Medicine and Healing". ''African Journal of Traditional, Complementary, and Alternative Medicines'' v. 4 no. 4 (June 2007) p. 501-509. ()〕 Gardenia thunbergia00.jpg|''Gardenia thunbergia'' by Edith Struben (1868-1936) Gardenia thunbergia IMG 5865.JPG|Habit of a well-grown tree in a moist garden environment Gardenia thunbergia Detail of fruit IMG 5870.JPG|Detail of fruit that accumulates indefinitely on the tree until forcibly removed. ==See also== * List of Southern African indigenous trees 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Gardenia thunbergia」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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