Cassia abbreviata, commonly known as the sjambok pod or long-tail cassia, is a mostly tropical tree species in the genus Cassia, which is native to Africa.
Native distribution
Cassia abbreviata is native to east, northeast, south, and west-central Africa; found in Botswana, the DRC, Kenya, Mozambique, Namibia, Somalia, South Africa (in the provinces of Limpopo and Mpumalanga), Eswatini, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Uses Proguibourtinidins, a type of condensed tannins, can be found in C. abbreviata and guibourtinidol, a flavan-3ol, can be found in its heartwood.The novel Flavan-3-ol, (2R,3S )-guibourtinidol and its diastereomers. Reinier J.J. Nel, Makhosazana Mthembu, Johan Coetzee, Hendrik van Rensburg, Elfranco Malan and Daneel Ferreira, Phytochemistry 52 (1999) 1153-1158
C. abbreviata is known as an important medicine plant in Botswana where it is called monepenepe.
Subspecies Three subspecies are distinguished on the basis of petal size, pubescence and geographical distribution: Cassia abbreviata subsp. abbreviata Cassia abbreviata subsp. beareana (Holmes) Brenan Cassia abbreviata subsp. kassneri (Baker f.) Brenan
See also List of Southern African indigenous trees and woody lianes
References
External links Cassia abbreviata on www.ildis.org