I. Friis (2006) Sapotaceae Flora of Somalia 3: 12- 18
Plants trees or shrubs, spiny or unarmed; milky latex scarce or absent. Leaves alternate, without stipules, often clustered at the ends of branches or on short, lateral shoots,venation variable. Inflorescences axillary, sometimes developing after the leaves have fallent.of solitary flowers or clusters of flowers. Flowers usually bisexual, rarely unisexual but, if so, plants usually with both species presen; calyces a single whorlof 5(-8) free, overlapping sepals; corollas cup-shaped, usually glabrous, tube nearly always shorter than the lobes, lobes (4-)5(-8), spreading, entire, occasionaly dividedinto 3 segments; stamens (4-)5(-8), in a single whorl at top of corolla tube, exserted; filamens well developed; anthers opening outwards, usually glabrous, sometimes converted into staminodes and the flowerr functionally female; staminodes (4-)5(-8), usually well-developed, alternating with the stamens, often lanceolate, pressed against; ovaries (1-)5(-8)-celled, hairy or glabrous; styles exserted orincluded. Fruits 1-2-seeded, fleshy, usually glabrous; seeds globose, ovoid, oblong or ellipsoid, not laterally compressed, rarely plano-conved if fruit 2-seeded; testa smooth, shiny, smooth, free from fruit wall, often scuptured on the adaxial surface; scar nearly always basal or basiventral, small, circulate, lanceolate or elliptic.
Sideroxylon has about 50 species in tropical Amerc and 25 in the Old World.