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Brabejum
''Brabejum'' is a genus of a single species of large evergreen tree, ''Brabejum stellatifolium'' in the family Proteaceae, commonly called wild almond, bitter almond or ghoeboontjie. It is restricted in the wild to South Africa's Western Cape province, where it grows in thickets along the banks of streams. The plant is of botanical interest as being Africa's only member of the large grevilleoid subfamily. It is a bushy small tree with branches widely at ground level and numerous erect vigorous stems. Leaves grow up to 6 in (15 cm) long, narrow and bluntly toothed, appear at intervals along the branches, mostly in whorls of 6. In summer, the plant bears white flowers densely crowded on spikes arising from rusty buds at the leaf axils. The fruits to 2 in (5 cm) long, magenta to reddish brown, similar to an almond, appear in autumn. The nut is too bitter to eat; however, in earlier times it was boiled, roasted, and ground to make a "coffee" drink. This tree has special sig ...
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Whorl (botany)
In botany, a whorl or verticil is an arrangement of leaves, sepals, petals, stamens, or carpels that radiate from a single point and surround or wrap around the stem or stalk. A leaf whorl consists of at least three elements; a pair of opposite leaves is not called a whorl. For leaves to grow in whorls is fairly rare except in plant species with very short internodes and some other genera (Galium, Nerium, Elodea etc.). Leaf whorls occur in some trees such as ''Brabejum stellatifolium'' and other species in the family Proteaceae (e.g., in the genus ''Banksia''). In plants such as these, crowded internodes within the leaf whorls alternate with long internodes between the whorls. The morphology of most flowers (called cyclic flowers) is based on four types of whorls: # The calyx: zero or more whorls of sepals at the base # The corolla: zero or more whorls of petals above the calyx # The androecium: zero or more whorls of stamens, each comprising a filament and an anther # The gyn ...
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Proteaceae
The Proteaceae form a family of flowering plants predominantly distributed in the Southern Hemisphere. The family comprises 83 genera with about 1,660 known species. Together with the Platanaceae and Nelumbonaceae, they make up the order Proteales. Well-known genera include ''Protea'', ''Banksia'', ''Embothrium'', ''Grevillea'', ''Hakea'' and ''Macadamia''. Species such as the New South Wales waratah (''Telopea speciosissima''), king protea (''Protea cynaroides''), and various species of ''Banksia'', ''soman'', and ''Leucadendron'' are popular cut flowers. The nuts of ''Macadamia integrifolia'' are widely grown commercially and consumed, as are those of Gevuina avellana on a smaller scale. Australia and South Africa have the greatest concentrations of diversity. Etymology The name Proteaceae was adapted by Robert Brown from the name Proteae coined in 1789 for the family by Antoine Laurent de Jussieu, based on the genus ''Protea'', which in 1767 Carl Linnaeus derived from t ...
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Grevilleoideae
The Grevilleoideae are a subfamily of the plant family Proteaceae. Mainly restricted to the Southern Hemisphere, it contains around 46 genera and about 950 species. Genera include ''Banksia'', ''Grevillea'', and ''Macadamia''. Description The Grevilleoideae grow as trees, shrubs, or subshrubs. They are highly variable, making a simple, diagnostic identification key for the subfamily essentially impossible to provide. One common and fairly diagnostic characteristic is the occurrence of flowers in pairs that share a common bract. However, a few Grevilleoideae taxa do not have this property, having solitary flowers or inflorescences of unpaired flowers. In most taxa, the flowers occur in densely packed heads or spikes, and the fruit is a follicle. Distribution and habitat Grevilleoideae are mainly a Southern Hemisphere family. The main centre of diversity is Australia, with around 700 of 950 species occurring there, and South America also contains taxa. However, the Grevilleoidea ...
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Grevilleoideae
The Grevilleoideae are a subfamily of the plant family Proteaceae. Mainly restricted to the Southern Hemisphere, it contains around 46 genera and about 950 species. Genera include ''Banksia'', ''Grevillea'', and ''Macadamia''. Description The Grevilleoideae grow as trees, shrubs, or subshrubs. They are highly variable, making a simple, diagnostic identification key for the subfamily essentially impossible to provide. One common and fairly diagnostic characteristic is the occurrence of flowers in pairs that share a common bract. However, a few Grevilleoideae taxa do not have this property, having solitary flowers or inflorescences of unpaired flowers. In most taxa, the flowers occur in densely packed heads or spikes, and the fruit is a follicle. Distribution and habitat Grevilleoideae are mainly a Southern Hemisphere family. The main centre of diversity is Australia, with around 700 of 950 species occurring there, and South America also contains taxa. However, the Grevilleoidea ...
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Van Riebeeck
Johan Anthoniszoon "Jan" van Riebeeck (21 April 1619 – 18 January 1677) was a Dutch navigator and colonial administrator of the Dutch East India Company. Life Early life Jan van Riebeeck was born in Culemborg, as the son of a surgeon. He grew up in Schiedam, where he married 19-year-old Maria de la Queillerie on 28 March 1649. She died in Malacca, now part of Malaysia, on 2 November 1664, at the age of 35. The couple had eight or nine children, most of whom did not survive infancy. Their son Abraham van Riebeeck, born at the Cape, later became Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies. Employment in the VOC Joining the ''Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie'' (VOC) (Dutch East India Company) in 1639, he served in a number of posts, including that of an assistant surgeon in the Batavia in the East Indies. He was head of the VOC trading post in Tonkin, Indochina. After being dismissed from that position in 1645 due to conducting trade for his own personal account, he ...
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Van Riebeeck's Hedge
Van Riebeeck's Hedge is a hedge planted in 1660 by Jan van Riebeeck to mark the border of the Dutch East India Company settlement in what is now Cape Town, South Africa. The hedge consisted of indigenous wild almond trees (''Brabejum stellatifolium''). Sections of the hedge can still be seen in Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden Kirstenbosch is an important botanical garden nestled at the eastern foot of Table Mountain in Cape Town. The garden is one of 10 National Botanical Gardens covering five of South Africa's six different biomes and administered by the South A ... and Bishopscourt, and have been declared a National Monument. References Natural history of Cape Town Buildings and structures associated with the Dutch East India Company {{SouthAfrica-hist-stub ...
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Kirstenbosch
Kirstenbosch is an important botanical garden nestled at the eastern foot of Table Mountain in Cape Town. The garden is one of 10 National Botanical Gardens covering five of South Africa's six different biomes and administered by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). Prior to 1 September 2004, the institute was known as the National Botanical Institute. Kirstenbosch places a strong emphasis on the cultivation of indigenous plants. When Kirstenbosch was founded in 1913 to preserve the flora native to the South Africa’s territory, it was the first botanical garden in the world with this ethos, at a time when invasive species were not considered an ecological and environmental problem. The garden includes a large conservatory (The Botanical Society Conservatory) exhibiting plants from a number of different regions, including savanna, fynbos, karoo and others. Outdoors, the focus is on plants native to the Cape region, highlighted by the spectacular col ...
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Phyllotaxis
In botany, phyllotaxis () or phyllotaxy is the arrangement of leaf, leaves on a plant stem. Phyllotactic spirals form a distinctive class of patterns in nature. Leaf arrangement The basic leaf#Arrangement on the stem, arrangements of leaves on a stem are opposite and alternate (also known as spiral). Leaves may also be Whorl (botany), whorled if several leaves arise, or appear to arise, from the same level (at the same Node (botany), node) on a stem. With an opposite leaf arrangement, two leaves arise from the stem at the same level (at the same Node (botany), node), on opposite sides of the stem. An opposite leaf pair can be thought of as a whorl of two leaves. With an alternate (spiral) pattern, each leaf arises at a different point (node) on the stem. Distichous phyllotaxis, also called "two-ranked leaf arrangement" is a special case of either opposite or alternate leaf arrangement where the leaves on a stem are arranged in two vertical columns on opposite sides of t ...
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Macadamia
''Macadamia'' is a genus of four species of trees in the flowering plant family Proteaceae. They are indigenous to Australia, native to northeastern New South Wales and central and southeastern Queensland specifically. Two species of the genus are commercially important for their fruit, the macadamia nut (or simply macadamia). Global production in 2015 was . Other names include Queensland nut, bush nut, maroochi nut, bauple nut and Hawaii nut. In Australian Aboriginal languages, the fruit is known by names such as ''bauple'', ''gyndl'' or ''jindilli'' (north of Great Dividing Range) and ''boombera'' (south of the Great Range). It was an important source of bushfood for the Aboriginal peoples who are the original inhabitants of the area. The nut was first commercially produced on a wide scale in Hawaii, where Australian seeds were introduced in the 1880s, and for some time, they were the world's largest producer. South Africa has been the world's largest producer of the maca ...
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Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, sixth-largest country. Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a Megadiverse countries, megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with Deserts of Australia, deserts in the centre, tropical Forests of Australia, rainforests in the north-east, and List of mountains in Australia, mountain ranges in the south-east. The ancestors of Aboriginal Australians began arriving from south east Asia approximately Early human migrations#Nearby Oceania, 65,000 years ago, during the Last Glacial Period, last i ...
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New Caledonia
) , anthem = "" , image_map = New Caledonia on the globe (small islands magnified) (Polynesia centered).svg , map_alt = Location of New Caledonia , map_caption = Location of New Caledonia , mapsize = 290px , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , established_title = Annexed by France , established_date = 24 September 1853 , established_title2 = Overseas territory , established_date2 = 1946 , established_title3 = Nouméa Accord , established_date3 = 5 May 1998 , official_languages = French , regional_languages = , capital = Nouméa , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , demonym = New Caledonian , government_type = Devolved parliamentary dependency , leader_title1 = President of France , leader_name1 = Emmanuel Macron , leader_title2 = President of the Government , leader_name2 = Louis Mapou , leader_title3 = President of the Congress , leader_name3 = Roch Wamytan , leader_title4 = High Commissioner , leader_name4 = Patrice ...
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South America
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southern subregion of a single continent called America. South America is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east by the Atlantic Ocean; North America and the Caribbean Sea lie to the northwest. The continent generally includes twelve sovereign states: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela; two dependent territories: the Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands; and one internal territory: French Guiana. In addition, the ABC islands of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Ascension Island (dependency of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, a British Overseas Territory), Bouvet Island ( dependency of Norway), Pa ...
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