Naked Indian, Almácigo, Carate, Huechichi, Indio desnudo Dioecious or polygamodioecious tree, 5-25 m tall, to ca 40 (100) cm dbh; bark coppery red, shiny, thin, peeling to expose green layer beneath; sap, at least of fruit, very aromatic. Leaves pinnate, deciduous, clustered at apex of branches, densely woolly when young to glabrate except on veins below in age; petioles to 14 cm long; leaflets 5-7 (9), ovate-elliptic to lanceolate-elliptic (terminal ones usually obovate), long-acuminate, inequilateral and obtuse to rounded at base, 4.5-14.5 cm long, 2.5-8 cm wide, entire. Flowers 3-5-parted, functionally unisexual, in axillary raceme-like panicles (sometimes appearing terminal before leaves appear), appearing +/- with new leaves; calyx bowl-shaped, shallowly 5-lobed, the lobes acute to blunt; petals greenish-white, narrowly ovate, acute, cucullate, 2-3 mm long, spreading at anthesis, later recurved; stamens twice the number of and shorter than petals, those opposite the petals usually +/- spreading, the alternate ones erect; pollen golden-yellow, covering all sides of anther at anthesis; pistillode ovoid, white, glabrous, scarcely longer than weakly lobed and undulate disk. Capsules drupaceous, ellipsoid, obtusely 3-sided, maturing reddish-brown, ca 1 cm long, a single valve falling free at maturity to expose the pyrene, followed by both remaining valves falling off as a unit, leaving the pyrene attached at base; pyrene 1(2), 1-seeded, 3-angled, bony, lenticular-ovoid, white, ca 7 mm long. Croat 5325. Occasional, but locally common, especially along the shore on the northwest side of the island and on Orchid Island. Flowers in the late dry and early rainy seasons (March to the middle of June), just before or during the onset of new leaves. Mature fruits may be seen through out much of the year, but most fruits mature during the late rainy or early dry seasons of the following year, generally after the plant has lost its leaves. Most trees are bare by February, beginning to put on new leaves and flowering by March or April. Allen (1956) reported that the trees are leafless throughout most of the dry season in Costa Rica.