380 USEFUL PLANTS OF GUAM. 



Sword bean. See Canavali ensiforme. 

 Sword grass. See Xiphagrostis floriclulus. 

 Synedrella nodiflora. 



Family Asteraceae. 

 An introduced weed of tropical American origin with inconspicuous sessile axillary 

 and terminal heads of flowers. Plant erect, dichotomously branched; stem and 

 branches terete, glabrous; leaves ovate-lanceolate, short-petioled, serrate, scaberu- 

 lous, 3-nerved; heads small; inner involucre of bracts linear-lanceolate, shining; ray 

 flowers 1 or 2-seriate, fertile, ligule short, broad, 2 or 3-toothed; disk-flowers her- 

 maphrodite, fertile, tubular, limb 4-toothed; achenes slender, black; spines 2 to 3 

 times as long, erect, very stout. 



Hitherto unknown from Guam; but of wide tropical distribution. Common near 

 cultivation. 



References: 

 Synedrella nodiflora (L.) Gaertn. Fruct. 2: 456. t. 171. 1791. 

 Verbesina nodiflora L. Cent. PI. 1: 28. 1755; Amoen. Acad. 4: 290. 1759. 

 Syrrhopodon. See Mosses. 

 Ta'amu (Samoa.) See Alocasia indica. 

 Tabaco (Spanish). See Nicotiana tabacum. 

 Tabayag (Philippines). See Lagenaria lagenaria. 

 Tabing (Philippines). See Abutilon indicum. 

 Tabunak (Philippines) . See Trichoon roxburghii. 

 Tacamahac. See Gums and resins, and Calophyllum inophyllum. 

 Tacca pinnatifida. Polynesian arrowroot. East Indian arrowroot. 



Family Taccaceae. 



Local names. — Gabgab, Gapgap,' Gaogao (Guam); Pannirien (Ilocos); Gaogao 

 (Philippines); Mamago (Bougainville Straits); Yabia (Fiji); Pia, Masoa 

 (Samoa); Pia (Tahiti, Hawaii); Pombwau (Burma). 

 An interesting, monocotyledonous plant having edible starchy tubers resembling 

 young potatoes, which yield the Polynesian or East Indian arrowroot. It has 3- 

 parted irregularly pinnatifid leaves which are all radical and an umbel of drooping 

 greenish flowers with a leafy involucre and a number of very long filiform bracts 

 resembling flower-pedicles. Scape leafless, tapering, longer than the petiole, striped 

 with dark and light green; flowers 10 to 40, subglobose, fleshy, 1.5 cm. in diameter, 

 6-lobed in two series, lobes greenish edged with purple; leaves of involucre lanceo- 

 late, recurved, striped with purple; filiform bracts very numerous; stamens 6, at the 

 base of the perianth lobes, filaments very short, base dilated or with an appendage 

 on each side and dilated above into an inflexed hood with 2 ribs or horns on the 

 inner surface; anthers sessile within the hood; ovary 1-celled; style short, included, 

 stigmas 3, broad or petaloid and reflexed like an umbrella over the style; ovules 

 many, on 3 parietal placentas; fruit the size of a pigeon's egg, 6-ribbed, yellow. 



As with the yams, the tubers are mature when the plants die down. They are 

 then dug up and are ready for conversion into starch or arrowroot. They are rasped 

 or grated into a fine pulp which is put into a tub of water. This becomes milky and 

 is strained through a coarse cloth or sieve to remove the coarser particles. On 

 standing for some time the starch settles on the bottom and the clear liquid is care- 

 fully poured off. The fresh root is very bitter, but by repeatedly pouring off the 

 water and replacing it by fresh water the bitter principle is removed. When the 

 starch is thoroughly washed it is dried in the sun after the manner of common 

 arrowroot and cassava starch. In Ilocos and Zambales, of the Philippine group, 

 where it is abundant, the natives prepare the starch by rasping the roots on a rough 

 stone in water. The starch finds a ready sale in Manila, where it is mixed with 



