''Alseuosmia'' is a
genus of five species of flowering plants in the family
Alseuosmiaceae, growing in
New Zealand's North Island
The North Island, also officially named Te Ika-a-Māui, is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but much less populous South Island by the Cook Strait. The island's area is , making it the world's 14th-largest ...
.
Species members are characteristically small evergreen shrubs. An example occurrence of species representative ''
Alseuosmia macrophylla'' is in the
habitat of the
Hamilton Ecological District, where ''
Blechnum discolor'' and ''
B.filiforme'' are understory elements with a ''
Nothofagus truncata'' and ''
Dacrydium cupressinum''
overstory
In biology, the canopy is the aboveground portion of a plant cropping or crop, formed by the collection of individual plant crowns.
In forest ecology, canopy also refers to the upper layer or habitat zone, formed by mature tree crowns an ...
.
''Alseuosmia'' was first described in 1839 from specimens collected in
Northland forests by
Cunningham
Cunningham is a surname of Scottish origin, see Clan Cunningham.
Notable people sharing this surname
A–C
*Aaron Cunningham (born 1986), American baseball player
*Abe Cunningham, American drummer
* Adrian Cunningham (born 1960), Australian ...
.
Other species are ''
A.banksii'', ''
A.pusilla'', ''
A.quercifolia'', and ''
A.turneri''.
''A.quercifolia'' is the most common of the species in lowland native forest of
Waikato, sometimes known as A.
Hakarimata. It is an
endemic shrub, found north of 38°05’S, up to tall,
though usually under . It has red or pink flowers of 5 petals, clustered at base of leaves, giving a strong scent.
References
Sources
* Thomas Frederick Cheeseman. 1906. ''Manual of the New Zealand Flora: Published Under the Authority of the Government of New Zealand'', published by J. Mackay, government printer, 1199 pages
* C. Michael Hogan. 2009
''Crown Fern: Blechnum discolor'', Globaltwitcher.com, ed. N. Stromberg
Alseuosmiaceae
Asterales genera
{{Asterales-stub