''Eucalyptus tetraptera'', commonly known as square-fruited mallee or four-winged mallee,Chippendale, G.M. (1973) ''Eucalypts of the Western Australian goldfields (and the adjacent wheatbelt)'', Canberra. AGPS p.175 is a mallee that 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 the south coast of

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

. It has smooth bark, thick lance-shaped to oblong adult leaves, single flower buds arranged in leaf

axil A leaf ( : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, st ...

s, red to pink flowers and square, prominently winged fruit.

Description

''Eucalyptus tetraptera'' is low, straggly mallee that typically grows to a height of and a similar width. It usually has a single low branching trunk with smooth, grey or whitish-grey bark. Young plants and

coppice Coppicing is a traditional method of woodland management which exploits the capacity of many species of trees to put out new shoots from their stump or roots if cut down. In a coppiced wood, which is called a copse, young tree stems are repeated ...

regrowth have egg-shaped to broadly elliptical leaves that are long and wide and

petiolate Petiole may refer to: *Petiole (botany), the stalk of a leaf, attaching the blade to the stem *Petiole (insect anatomy) In entomology, petiole is the technical term for the narrow waist of some hymenopteran insects, especially ants, bees, a ...

. Adult leaves are arranged alternately, the same shade of glossy green on both sides, thick, lance-shaped to oblong, long and wide, the base tapering to a narrowly flattened petiole long. The flower buds are arranged singly in leaf

s on a rigidly down-turned peduncle long, the peduncle often wider than long. Mature buds are cubic with broad, curved wings, long and wide with a pyramid-shaped operculum long. Flowering occurs from late winter to mid summer and the flowers are red to pink. The fruit is a woody, red,

sessile Sessility, or sessile, may refer to: * Sessility (motility), organisms which are not able to move about * Sessility (botany), flowers or leaves that grow directly from the stem or peduncle of a plant * Sessility (medicine), tumors and polyps that ...

, oblong capsule, long and wide including the wings on each corner.

Taxonomy and naming

''Eucalyptus tetraptera'' was first formally described by the Russian

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 ...

Nikolai Turczaninow Nikolai Stepanovich Turczaninow ( ru , Николай Степанович Турчанинов, 1796 in Nikitovka, now in Krasnogvardeysky District, Belgorod Oblast, Russia – 1863 in Kharkov) was a Russian botanist and plant collector who ...

in 1849 in the journal, ''Bulletin de la Société Impériale des Naturalistes de Moscou'' from specimens collected in 1848 by James Drummond. 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 ...

(''tetraptera'') is from

ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

words meaning "four" and "winged" referring to the fruit of this species.

Distribution and habitat

The distribution of the square-fruited mallee is limited to coastal sandplains where it is also found among

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

outcrops of southern

, north from the

Stirling Ranges The Stirling Range or Koikyennuruff is a range of mountains and hills in the Great Southern region of Western Australia, south-east of Perth. It is over wide from west to east, stretching from the highway between Mount Barker and Cranb ...

and south to around Albany east to

Israelite Bay Israelite Bay is a bay and locality on the south coast of Western Australia. Situated in the Shire of Esperance local government area, it lies east of Esperance and the Cape Arid National Park, within the Nuytsland Nature Reserve and the Grea ...

in the Great Southern and Goldfields-Esperance regions where it grows in white or grey sandy soils in heath.

Conservation status

This eucalypt is classified as "not threatened" by the Western Australian Government

Department of Parks and Wildlife The Department of Parks and Wildlife (DPaW) was the department of the Government of Western Australia responsible for managing lands described in the ''Conservation and Land Management Act 1984'' and implementing the state's conservation and e ...

Uses

''E. tetraptera'' is one of the most bizarre of the eucalypts with its spectacular, large, red buds and fruit. A popular ornamental, it grows well in full sun in semi-arid climates but is slower growing in cooler climates. It is

smog Smog, or smoke fog, is a type of intense air pollution. The word "smog" was coined in the early 20th century, and is a portmanteau of the words ''smoke'' and '' fog'' to refer to smoky fog due to its opacity, and odor. The word was then inte ...

and

frost Frost is a thin layer of ice on a solid surface, which forms from water vapor in an above-freezing atmosphere coming in contact with a solid surface whose temperature is below freezing, and resulting in a phase change from water vapor (a gas) ...

resistant and can be kept in containers. As the plant becomes straggly with age it can be cut back to ground level to rejuvenate. The plant is commercially available as seedlings or as seeds. As for most Eucalypts, the seeds will germinate readily.

References