Athrotaxis

D.Don 1841

Common names

Tasmanian cedar.

Taxonomic notes

A genus of two species and one hybrid, or (in this treatment) three species.

Description

Monoecious evergreen trees with bark peeling off in thin, long strips. Branchlets spreading, thick, ultimate branchlets deciduous. Buds inconspicuous. Leaves homomorphic, scale-like and appressed or lanceolate and loosely disposed, uniform in shape and size, thick, with faint or prominent stomata. Male cones solitary, catkin-like, with imbricate spirally arranged aments, anthers 2-celled. Female cones woody, globose, maturing in one year, with many triangular scales; scales with a small recurved apical umbo or scales thing, papery and without umbos. Seeds 3-6 per scale, oblong, thin, with 2 narrow even wings. Cotyledons 2 (Silba 1986).

Range

The temperate rain forests of Tasmania.

Big tree

See A. selaginoides.

Oldest

Dendrochronology

Ethnobotany

Observations

Remarks

"Athrotaxis comes from two Greek words athros= crowded, and taxis= arrangement, referring to the overlapping arrangement of the leaves" (ANBG [no date]).

Citations

See also

Farjon 2005 (as two species).

Gymnosperms of New Zealand.