Ficus drupacea has one of the widest ranges of any strangling fig. F. drupacea is found from Sri Lanka north to Hong Kong, east to the Solomon Islands and south to N Australia.
Surprisingly within Borneo F. drupacea has a very restricted distribution in coastal areas of N. Borneo south to Brunei. However, within this limited range Ficus drupacea is locally common in urban areas including Kota Belud, Kota Kinabalu and Bandar Sri Begawan on the west coast and Sandakan and Tawau on the east coast. See this link to Ficus drupacea growing at Kg Titigan, Tawau.
All photos in this article are by Dr Zainal Zahari Zainuddin taken in urban Tawau.
Note that the amount of hair on the leaves and stipules varies greatly between different trees and also within single trees.
