''Allocasuarina globosa'' is a species of flowering plant in the family

Casuarinaceae The Casuarinaceae are a family of dicotyledonous flowering plants placed in the order Fagales, consisting of four genera and 91 species of trees and shrubs native to eastern Africa, Australia, Southeast Asia, Malesia, Papuasia, and the Pacifi ...

and is endemic to a restricted part of inland Western Australia. It is a

dioecious Dioecy (; ; adj. dioecious , ) is a characteristic of a species, meaning that it has distinct individual organisms (unisexual) that produce male or female gametes, either directly (in animals) or indirectly (in seed plants). Dioecious reproductio ...

shrub that has more or less erect branchlets, its leaves reduced to scales in whorls of ten to twelve, the mature fruiting cones more or less spherical and long, containing winged seeds (samaras) long.

Description

''Allocasuarina eriochlamys'' is a dioecious shrub that typically grows to a height of . Its branchlets are more or less erect, up to long, the leaves reduced to scale-like teeth long, arranged in whorls of ten to twelve around the branchlets. The sections of branchlet between the leaf whorls (the "articles") are mostly long and wide. Mature cones are more or less spherical, long and in diameter, containing brown samaras long.

Taxonomy

''Allocasuarina globosa'' was first formally described in 1989 in the '' Flora of Australia'' from specimens collected by

John Stanley Beard John Stanley Beard (15 February 1916 – 17 February 2011) was a British-born forester and ecologist who resided in Australia. Beard studied at the University of Oxford where he completed his doctoral thesis on tropical forestry. While working ...

in the

Bremer Range Bremer may refer to: People *Bremer (surname) *Bremer Ehrler (born 1914), American politician * Bremer (born 1997), Brazilian footballer Places ;Australia *Bremer Bay, Western Australia *Bremer Marine Park *Bremer Island * Bremer River (disambigua ...

in 1964. The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

(''globosus'') means a "spherical", referring to the fruiting cones.

Distribution and habitat

This sheoak is only known from Mount Day at the end of the Bremer Range, west of

Norseman The Norsemen (or Norse people) were a North Germanic ethnolinguistic group of the Early Middle Ages, during which they spoke the Old Norse language. The language belongs to the North Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages and is the pre ...

where it grows in dense scrubland with '' A. campestris'' at the bottom of a steep slope, in the Coolgardie bioregion of inland Western Australia.

Conservation status

''Allocasuarina globosa'' is listed as "

Threatened Threatened species are any species (including animals, plants and fungi) which are vulnerable to endangerment in the near future. Species that are threatened are sometimes characterised by the population dynamics measure of ''critical depensat ...

" by the Western Australian Government

Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions The Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA) is the Western Australian government The Government of Western Australia, formally referred to as His Majesty's Government of Western Australia, is the Australian state de ...

, meaning that it is in danger of extinction.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15375679 globosa Rosids of Western Australia Fagales of Australia Plants described in 1989 Dioecious plants Taxa named by Lawrence Alexander Sidney Johnson