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[The following text is supplemental to the Subtropicalia Flowering Trees article on p.78 of STG Issue 20]

General Information about Syzygium:

Syzygium is a genus of approximately 1200 trees and shrubs, from the old world tropics and subtropics including South Africa, South and East Asia, Australia and the Pacific Islands.

Syzygium is a genus of well known and commonly used plants through tropical and subtropical landscapes as most species have dense bushy growth excellent for screening if shrub sized, or as shade trees if larger. Ornamental features found in many species are colourful new growth flushes, ‘fluffy’ flowers, large colourful fruit and attractive bark.

Syzygium species can be found filling a diverse range of habitat niches, from the equatorial tropics to warm temperate zones, from sea level in dune scrubs to montane cloud forests, from the wet jungles to dry monsoon savannahs, from canopy trees to understorey shrubs, and rheophytic along streams. At least one candidate species could probably be found to suit just about any challenging landscape application.

Common names vary considerably as could be expected in such a large widespread genus, in Australia some species (often the smaller or more southern species) are termed Lillypilly with a preceding qualifier, others as Satinash (often the more northern, larger trees once cut for millable timber), and others as Cherry or Apple, referring to their small, colourful and edible fruit. In South East Asia, the Malay name Jambu is applied generically with a following qualifier for each cultivated fruit species. 

Syzygium malaccense
The true extent of its native range is confused by a long history of cultivation and subsequent local naturalization in other tropical to subtropical areas, including much of the Pacific Islands, India and Sri Lanka.
Young trees have proved to be remarkably tolerant of transplanting if cut back to a branch framework and stripped of leaves.

For more related species:

Giant Lau-Lau(Syzygium megacarpa) is popularly planted by the New Guinea community and other tropical fruit enthusiasts in Cairns and the Australian tropics and subtropics. It tends to be larger in all its parts with big heavily prominently veined leaves, flushed red when new, larger and fluffier pink flowers along the twigs and even larger fruit, similar in size, shape colour and taste. This may be a mis-applied species name.

Gowok (Syzygium polycephala) has a dense rounded canopy of quilted, leathery glossy dark green leaves, white flowers along the branches followed by small rounded purple-black fruit. 

Note: Syzygium megacarpa may actually apply to a quite different spp, so this plant may just be an extreme variation of S. malaccense, or if species in its own right some people have dubbed it "megaphylla".