The research intends to characterize trees and fruits from natural populations of Hancornia speciosa Gomes, as well as evaluate the distribution of phenotypic variability among them. Populations of mangaba trees were sampled in the Cerrado, including the states of Goiás, Tocantins, Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul, and Bahia, covering 109 mother plants from 35 populations of the botanical varieties pubescens, gardneri, speciosa and cuyabensis. The results showed that the H. speciosa plants have high levels of phenotypic variation in terms of fruit characterization and, on the whole, most of this variation occurs among populations. There is also a large phenotypic variability within the botanical varieties. H. speciosa var. gardneri and H. speciosa var. pubescens fruits are larger and heavier. The botanic variety gardneri shows gait more high than the others varieties. In the varieties gardneri and pubescens predominate round shape and light green color, while in speciosa and cuyabensis predominate oblong shape and dark yellow and dark green colors, respectively. The varieties gardneri and pubescens stand out as the most potential for selection based on the characters of the fruit size and fruit mass.
mangaba; phenotipic variability; native specie
