''Allocasuarina zephyrea'' 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 Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to Tasmani. 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 branchlets up to long, the leaves reduced to scales in whorls of seven to nine or ten, the fruiting cones long containing winged seeds long.

Description

''Allocasuarina zephyrea'' is a dioecious shrub that typically grows to a height of . Its branchlets are up to long, the leaves reduced to scale-like teeth long, arranged in whorls of seven to nine or ten around the branchlets. The sections of branchlet between the leaf whorls are long, wide. Male flowers are arranged in spikes long, with 5 to 7 whorls per centimetre (per 0.39 in.), the

anthers The stamen (plural ''stamina'' or ''stamens'') is the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower. Collectively the stamens form the androecium., p. 10 Morphology and terminology A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filam ...

long. Female cones are on a peduncle long, and mature cones long and in diameter, containing black, winged seeds long. This allocasuarina is similar to '' A. grampiana''.

Taxonomy

''Allocasuarina zephyrea'' was first formally described in 1989 by the

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

Lawrence Alexander Sidney Johnson Lawrence Alexander Sidney Johnson FAA, (26 June 1925 – 1 August 1997) known as Lawrie Johnson, was an Australian taxonomic botanist. He worked at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney, for the whole of his professional career, as a botanist (1948 ...

in the ''

Flora of Australia The flora of Australia comprises a vast assemblage of plant species estimated to over 30,000 vascular and 14,000 non-vascular plants, 250,000 species of fungi and over 3,000 lichens. The flora has strong affinities with the flora of Gondwana, ...

'' at Ocean Beach near Strahan in 1949. 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 ...

(''zephyrea'') means "west wind", referring to the species' occurrence on the western side of Tasmania.

Habitat and distribution

''Allocasuarina zephyrea'' is endemic to Tasmania, growing in woodland, heath, sedgeland and on rocky outcrops from the western lowlands to central and south-eastern highlands, as well as on

King Island King Island, Kings Island or King's Island may refer to: Australia * King Island (Queensland) * King Island, at Wellington Point, Queensland * King Island (Tasmania) ** King Island Council, the local government area that contains the Tasmanian is ...

References

External links

Occurrence data for ''Allocasuarina zephyrea''
from The Australasian Virtual Herbarium
Flora of Tasmania ''Key to the Casuarinaceae'' (of Tasmania)
{{Taxonbar, from=Q15376723 zephyrea Flora of Tasmania Fagales of Australia Plants described in 1989 Taxa named by Lawrence Alexander Sidney Johnson