The Fried Egg Tree, Oncoba spinosa, also known as Snuff-box tree is a prickly evergreen or deciduous shrub and some of the times small, up to 8 meters, fruit bearing tree from tropical Africa. The Oncoba spinosa is a member of the family Flacourtiaceae the genus Oncoba.


Leaves of the fried egg tree are simple, generally alternate, with a somewhat pointed top, rounded, dark shiny green and somewhat leathery with coarsely serrated margins. In Africa, both the leaves and roots are employed in medicine for dysentery and bladder complaints.

The flowers of the fried egg tree are bisexual, large, beautiful, camellia-like, white, honey-fragrant, solitary, about 6-8cm crosswise, borne on late spring to summer. Flowers develop from buds formed at the bases of the straight and up to 5 cm in length thorns.

The beautiful white flowers with their yellow stamens in the center give the visual image of ‘fried eggs’ when drop off and fall on the ground facing upwards.

The fruits are rounded, up to 6cm in diameter with a tough shell that turns dark-reddish brown when mature while small glossy brown seeds are embedded in a somewhat dry, sour, yellowish pulp. The fruit of Oncoba spinosa is edible but is only used occasionally for that purpose.

Tree propagation is by seeds and it is not hard. First off growth of the plant is slow but could grow from 50cm to 1 meter a year, after the initial 9 to 12 months, depending on the rate of the local rainfall.

Fried Egg Tree, Oncoba spinosa

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