Chinaberry

Family

Meliaceae

Habit

Tree

Height

9 m

Spread

9 m

Growth

very fast

Lifespan

60 years

First yield

after 4 years

Hardiness

zone 7–11

Shade tolerance

light shade

Soil

Sand, Silt, Loam, Clay

Soil moisture

dry – very moist

pH

5.5 – 8.5

Synonyms

Melia australis; Melia sempervirens; Melia japonica

Times apply to the northern hemisphere in a temperate climate and shift with altitude and cultivar.

Other uses: The wood is light, ring-porous and mahogany-like in figure — botanically the chinaberry does sit in the mahogany family. It dries fast, moves little, works well and is moderately durable; in India and Argentina it goes into furniture, veneer, crates and instruments. A trunk is usable after 20 to 30 years, exceptionally fast for a furniture timber. The leaves contain limonoids related to the azadirachtin of neem but weaker: sprayed as an infusion or laid dry into grain stores and seed sacks, they keep stored-product pests away. Dried stones have a natural perforation and were strung into rosary beads for centuries.

Full sun to light shade, warm, sheltered from sharp late frost. Soil is almost irrelevant: sandy to loamy, acidic to strongly calcareous (pH 5.5 to 8.5), even compacted, saline or contaminated. Only waterlogging is a problem. Hardy to about -10 to -12 °C when mature (USDA 7-11), young trees much less so; it leafs out late and thus escapes most late frosts. Once established it is markedly drought-tolerant and gets through a Portuguese summer without irrigation — but water it through the first two seasons while the taproot is still shallow. It grows extremely fast, up to 1 m a year, and takes any cut down to the stump. Important for planning: it sheds dense leaf litter and masses of fruit in autumn — never plant it over terraces, paths, cisterns or poultry runs. Remove self-sown seedlings consistently, or it becomes a nuisance.

Seed is the normal route and works almost by itself: extract the stones from the fruits that hang on through winter, soak them 24 to 48 hours and sow shallowly in spring; germination at 20 to 25 °C within three to six weeks, with a high germination rate. Under mature trees it comes up on its own anyway — wildlings can simply be dug and moved in their first year. Semi-ripe summer cuttings and winter root cuttings also strike. After cutting back, the stump resprouts vigorously, so a felled tree carries on as coppice without further input.

The fragrant, lilac-like panicles in May and June are a good source for bees and hoverflies at a time when much has already finished flowering in the south. The yellow drupes hang on the bare tree all winter and are eaten by starlings, thrushes and blackbirds, which largely tolerate the meliatoxins and spread the tree accordingly — large quantities can visibly intoxicate birds. The dense umbrella crown offers nest sites and cover.

For building a food forest in Portugal and the wider Mediterranean, the chinaberry is above all one thing: fast. It puts on up to a metre a year, casts real shade from its third season, and quickly builds the microclimate that more sensitive fruit trees need to establish. Planted as a nurse tree, chopped and dropped and later thinned out, it delivers shade, windbreak, large volumes of fast-rotting mulch and, in the end, a usable furniture timber. It coppices reliably. The price: the fruits are poisonous, it self-seeds heavily and is considered invasive in several countries — it does not belong in a family garden or near pasture, and whoever plants it must stay on top of the seedlings.

Native to India, southern China, Southeast Asia and northern Australia. Planted for centuries as a street and shade tree across the Mediterranean, the Middle East, Africa and the Americas, and widely naturalised. Ubiquitous in Portuguese and Spanish villages, squares and roadsides. Classified as invasive in the south-eastern United States, Australia, South Africa and Argentina.

Open woodland, forest edges, riverbanks and disturbed ground from sea level to about 1,500 m in subtropical and warm-temperate zones. Undemanding about soil type, tolerant of lime, salt, compaction and urban conditions; sensitive only to waterlogging and hard late frost.