Plant: Small trees or shrubs; to 10 m high, the outer bark exfoliating in sheets,

Leaves: (3-)5-12 cm long, (3-)4-7 cm wide; petiole 1-2(-3) cm long; leaflets (3) 5-15, 1-4 cm long, 3-15 mm wide, lanceolate to elliptic, the margins entire or irregularly dentate, the midvein prominant, the terminal leaflet equal to or longer than the lateral leaflets

INFLORESCENCE: uniflorous or a cyme of 2-5(-6) flowers (in ours) to paniculate, generally appearing before or with the first leaves, mostly bracteate

Flowers: small; sepals in ours light green to slightly reddish, triangular, as many as petals, 1-2 mm long (in ours), basally connate, valvate; petals in ours reflexed at anthesis, white-cream colored (in ours) to pale yellow, greenish or reddish, lanceolate, valvate, 3-4 mm long (in ours), 3 (-5) in pistillate flowers, (3-)5 in staminate flowers; stamens in ours about twice the number of petals, in two whorls, inserted in the base of the nectar-disc, mostly smaller and sterile in pistillate flowers, the filaments ca. 1 mm long, the anthers 1.5-2 mm long; nectar-disc annular, 6-10 lobed, light yellowish-cream (in ours); pistil with 2 or in ours 3 carpels with stigma lobes and locules equalling carpels in number, the style short; ovules 2 per locule

Fruit: with 1 valve per carpel, in ours purplish-green, 5-7 mm long, 5-6 mm wide; peduncle recurved; SEEDS at maturity with a thin orangish-red aril (in ours), 5-6 mm long

Notes: larger branches with cream colored latex-like resin; twigs greyish-brown, slightly aromatic, with transparent resin

REFERENCES: Salywon, Andrew. 1999. Burseraceae. Ariz.-Nev. Acad. Sci. 32(1).