Cupressus cashmeriana

Royle ex Carrière 1867

Common Names

Kashmir Cypress (Dallimore et al. 1967).

Taxonomic Notes

Syn.: Cupressus torulosa D.Don var. cashmeriana (Royle ex Carrière) Kent 1900; Cupressus pendula Griff. 1848 non Thunb. 1784; Cupressus torulosis Griff. 1854 non D.Don (torulosa) 1824; Cupressus himalaica Silba 1987; Cupressus himalaica Silba var. darjeelingensis Silba 1990; Cupressus darjeelingensis (Silba) Silba 1994; Cupressus assamica Silba 1994; Cupressus pseudohimalaica Silba 1994 (Farjon 1998).

Description

Small trees, crown conical or narrowly pyramidal habit with ascending branches and pendulous branchlets that are often several feet long, the older ones reddish-brown and bare of leaves in the third or fourth year. Branchlets long and pendulous, conspicuously flattened, 2- or 3-pinnate, the ultimate divisions compressed. Leaves blue-green, glaucous or of an iridescent tinge, with attenuate, spreading tips. Seed cones globose, 12 mm across, initially pale green and bluish pruinose, later dark brown, composed of 10 scales depressed at the centre, with a pointed, triangular and reflexed process, about 10 seeds to each scale. Seeds numerous, about 10 to each scale, winged (Dallimore et al. 1967, Vidakovic 1991).

"This, the most beautiful and elegant of all the cypresses, appears to be a juvenile form of C. torulosa which it closely resembles in its cones. It was formerly considered to be a well-marked variety of C. funebris, but differs from that species in the larger number of cone scales and in having about 10 seeds on each scale" (Dallimore et al. 1967).

Range

Bhutan, India: ?Arunachal Pradesh (Farjon 1998).

Big Tree

A 60-foot (18-meter) specimen at the Huntingdon Botanical Gardens in California was snapped off at the ground during a windstorm in January, 1997 (San Marcos Growers [no date]).

Oldest

Dendrochronology

Ethnobotany

Observations

Dallimore et al. (1967) report that "[a]lthough not well known in Britain, it is represented in the Temperate House at Kew. The most famous tree in Europe was that on the Isola Madre at Lake Maggiore. It was a specimen over 60 ft. high, of remarkable beauty. C. cashmeriana can only be grown out of doors in the mildest parts of England and Ireland."

Remarks

Citations

San Marcos Growers. [no date]. Cupressus cashmeriana - Kashmir Cypress. http://www.smgrowers.com/products/plants/plantdisplay.asp?cat_id=11&plant_id=480&page=2, accessed 2007.07.19.