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Talok (Muntingia calabura)

Talok or kersen or calabur tree (Muntingia calabura L.) is a tree species in Muntingiaceae, producing small, sweet, bright green and red fruits. These shrubs generally grow only 3-6 m tall, enduring green, continue to flower and bear fruit throughout the year.

M. calabura has horizontal branches, hanging at the ends and forming a shady shade. Twigs and leaves have fine hair mixed with glandular hair. The leaves are flat, alternating in asymmetrical strands, round lanceolate eggs, jagged and pointed edges, measuring 1-4x4-14 cm, dense gray haired underside and short stem. Tapering leaves in the form of threads, the longer they dry and fall out, while in other parts rudimentary.

Dlium Talok (Muntingia calabura)

Talok flowers appear among the leaves in a file containing up to 5 buds on the armpit above the growing leaves, long-stemmed, twins and five, petals sharing in, tapered tangle shaped thread and fine hair. Flat crown, round egg upside down, white thin, bald and 1 cm in diameter.

Stamen amounts to 10 to more than 100 strands. The blooming flower protrudes outward, above the leaves, but after becoming a fruit it hangs down and is hidden under the leaf blade. Generally only one or two flowers become fruit in each file.

Kersen fruit is long stem, almost perfect round, 1 cm to 1.5 cm in diameter, green, yellow and finally red, crowned with the rest of the stigma that does not fall like a five-pointed black star. Contains thousands of seeds, smooth, yellowish white, immersed in meat and has very sweet juices.

In every 100 grams the calabur tree fruit contains water (77.8 g), protein (0.324 g), fat (1.56 g), fiber (4.6 g), calcium (124.6 mg), phosphorus (84,0 mg), iron (1.18 mg), carotene (0.019 mg), vitamin B1 (Thiamine) (0.065 mg), riboflavin (0.037 mg), niacin (0.554 mg), and vitamin C (Ascorbic Acid or antioxidants ) (80.5 mg).

Talok fruit is traditionally used for antiseptics, antispasmodics, relieves headaches, alleviates early symptoms of flu and colds, anti-inflammation, treats gout, cures diabetes, relieves flu symptoms, overcomes seizures in the digestive tract due to gastritis and diarrhea, lowers high blood pressure, reduce cholesterol levels in the blood, anti-tumor and restore the natural moisture of the skin.



The M. calabura fruit is preferred mainly by children, birds and bats. School children often climb trees, leaving traces of broken branches and peeled bark. This fruit is also processed for jam ingredients. Usually this tree is used as a shade for farmers to rest in the middle of rice fields.

Soft and easy to dry kersen wood, very useful as firewood. Easy to peel bark for straps and sanitary cloth. Leaves are brewed like tea. Fruit-eating birds often visit this tree to eat sweet fruit. Various types of fruit-eating bats come at night for the same purpose.

Calabur tree seeds are not digested by birds and bats, they are seed spreaders. Small trees often grow as wild seedlings on the curb, gutters or appear in the middle of cracks in floor or fence walls and eventually grow quickly into shade trees.

Kersen trees are often found in crowded cities, on the edge of sidewalks and parking lots, on the banks of rivers and places that are usually prolonged dry. This plant is one of the most pioneering plants found in human habitation in the tropics.

Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Rosids
Order: Malvales
Family: Muntingiaceae
Genus: Muntingia
Species: M. calabura
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