Common Name: desert olive

Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Tree

General: Much branched shrub 1-4 m tall the twigs firm and angular in their branching, finely striate with pale to dark gray bark.

Leaves: Opposite to fascicled, the blades oblanceolate to elliptic oblong, green on both surfaces 1.5-2.5 cm long, 4-10 mm wide, broadly cuneate at the base, narrowly revolute along the margins and finely puberulent on both surfaces.

Flowers: In small clusters of 2-6, the scales of flowers buds pale yellow, broadly ovate, about 1 mm long, faintly keeled, usually 4 stamens with dark purple anthers, on slender pedicels 4-7 mm long, glabrous.

Fruits: Usually asymmetrically curving, an ellipsoid drupe, 2.5-3.5 mm in diameter, 5-8 mm long, purplish black.

Ecology: Found on rocky canyon walls and slopes from 2,500-4,500 ft (762-1372 m), flowers December-March.

Distribution: Ranges across the lower Sonoran Desert in southern Arizona and south into northern Mexico.

Notes: The entire margin of the leaves, its being slightly and narrowly revolute, along with the puberulent surfaces.

Ethnobotany: Unknown

Etymology: Forestiera is named for Charles Le Forestier, an 18th century French naturalist and physician, while shrevei is an honorific for Forrest Shreve.

Synonyms: Forestiera phillyreoides

Editor: SBuckley 2011, FSCoburn 2015