410 WEST AFRICAN FORESTS AND FORESTRY 
soup. They have a distinctly bitter flavour, but make a very 
healthy vegetable soup. The leaves are often sold in the local 
markets. This shrub is occasionally left more or less in line 
as a small living fence. 
Vernonia cinerea (Les.). Ash-coloured Fleabane. Elegbe Oju 
(Yoruba). 
It is found in the Olokemeji Reserve of the Abeokuta 
province of Nigeria. A large, woody shrub, one of the chew- 
stick family, the leaves of which are sometimes used for 
making soup. 
Lycopodacee. 
Lycopodium phyllamaria (Linn.). 
This is a small Lycopodium found in the Benin province 
of Nigeria. It was obtained from the uppermost branches of 
a very tall tree, growing at the edge of a deep valley about 
8 miles north of Benin City. 
NON-INDIGENOUS TREES OF NIGERIA 
Myrtacez. 
Eucalyptus amygdalina. 
A specimen of this tree stands on the old beach at Akassa, 
Warri province. 
Eucalyptus tereticornis. 
Lagos Island. 
Eucalyptus rudis. 
Lagos Island. 
Eucalyptus tessitaris. 
Lagos Island. 
Eucalyptus citriodora. 
A specimen of this tree stands in the Botanical Gardens 
at Calabar. 
NOTES ON NIGERIAN TREES OF WHICH THE BOTANICAL 
NAMES ARE NOT KNOWN 
Itufiak or Etufiak (Efik). Essunwoi (Yoruba); Tako (Benin). 
It is a medium-sized tree of the freshwater swamps, with 
heavy dark-green foliage; it grows quite gregariously in stands 
of one to ten acres in extent. The trunk reaches a girth of about 
7 feet and a bole length of about 30 feet. The roots spurns are 
comparatively slight, and do not extend much over a foot up the 
bole. The foliage is very heavy and it casts a most dense shade, 
making patches of this forest the darkest of almost any in Africa. 
