Giant Raisin

Shrub or small tree. Bark reddish-brown, smooth with conspicuous lenticels; young branches covered in rust-coloured woolly hairs. Leaves alternate, oblong-elliptic, up to 10 × 6 cm, 3-veined from a distinctly asymmetric base, shiny green, hairless and somewhat rough above, densely yellowish-white woolly below; margin toothed, somewhat rolled under. Flowers showy, golden yellow, 4-5 cm in diameter, solitary or in 2-3-flowered axillary clusters. Fruit often deeply 2-lobed or divided, each part up to 2 cm in diameter, yellowish-brown to reddish when ripe, edible but with little flesh.

Tanzania (?), Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Swaziland and Limpopo, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

Grewia hexamita, the giant raisin, is a species of flowering plant in the family Malvaceae, native to Mozambique and adjoining countries. It is a large tree for a Grewia, reaching 5 m (16 ft). It is the most preferred woody plant of African savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana), who browse on it in all seasons, unlike even other species of Grewia.