Ficus mollis

Ficus mollis is a medium-sized and deciduous tree. The tree grows up to 12-15 m tall.

The bark of Ficus mollis is rough, warty and greyish-coloured.

The leaves of Ficus mollis grow alternately on the stem (spirally arranged).
The leaf is simple, pale green-coloured above and white yellowish beneath. The leaf is coriaceous and densely tomentose on the lower side (the upper side of the old leaves becoming glabrous).
The leaves have a 3-4 cm long petiole.
The leaf of Ficus mollis is 10-15 cm long and 6-8 cm wide. The shape of the blade is obovate, the apex is acute, the base is cordate and the margins are entire.
The venation of the leaf is pinnate.

The flowers of Ficus mollis are enclosed within a fleshy receptacle referred to as the fig. What we think of as a fruit is an inflorescence, a flower-bearing structure called syconium (*).
The syconium of Ficus mollis is monoecious, containing both female and male flowers and also gall flowers (hosts of pollinators).

(*) The syconium is an urn-shaped receptacle which contains between 50 to 7000 (depending on the species) highly simplified uniovulate flowers or florets on its inner surface. It is closed off from most organisms by the ostiole, formed by bracts.
Syconia can be monoecious or functionally dioecious : the former contain female flowers with variable style length and few male flowers, and produce seeds and pollen. The latter have male and female forms in different plants : seed figs contain female flowers with long styles and produce seeds; gall figs contain female flowers with short styles and male flowers and produce pollen.
Once pollinated, the florets develop into achenes or drupes, in which the seeds are enclosed by a layer of endocarp. From this perspective, the fig is an enclosure with tens to thousands of fruits within it. (Galil, J., Fig biology, 1977)

The fig, what we referred to as a fruit, is in fact a fleshy enclosure, an infructescence that contains hundreds of tiny fruits (achenes).

The fruits of Ficus mollis are tiny and globose achenes.

The figs are sessile, in pairs at the axil of the leaves.
They are 5-6 mm across, depressed-globose, downy and they are densely tomentose.

The crushed leaves of Ficus mollis are applied as a poultice to treat boils.

A paste made from the bark is applied as an ointment in the treatment of cuts and wounds. (Kottaimuthu, Ethnobotany of the Valaiyans of Karandamalai, Dindigul District, Tamil Nadu, India)