''Temu cruckshanksii'' (

Mapudungun Mapuche (, Mapuche & Spanish: , or Mapudungun; from ' 'land' and ' 'speak, speech') is an Araucanian language related to Huilliche spoken in south-central Chile and west-central Argentina by the Mapuche people (from ''mapu'' 'land' and ''che ...

: ''temu'') is a species of

plant Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclud ...

in the family

Myrtaceae Myrtaceae, the myrtle family, is a family of dicotyledonous plants placed within the order Myrtales. Myrtle, pōhutukawa, bay rum tree, clove, guava, acca (feijoa), allspice, and eucalyptus are some notable members of this group. All speci ...

. It is endemic to Chile. It is threatened by

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

. The purported variety "Heaven Scent" sold commercially is likely just the unimproved plant.

Taxonomy

The species was described as ''Temu cruckshanksii'' by

Otto Karl Berg Otto Karl Berg (15 August 1815 in Stettin – 20 November 1866 in Berlin) was a German botanist and pharmacist. The official abbreviation of his name, in botany, is O. Berg. He was the son of Johann Friedrich and Wilhelmine Friederike Ber ...

in 1861, but was later placed in the genus ''

Blepharocalyx ''Blepharocalyx'' is a genus of plant in family Myrtaceae first described as a genus in 1854. It is native to South America and the West Indies.McVaugh, R. 1989. Myrtaceae. In: Dicotyledoneae - Part 2. Flora of the Lesser Antilles, Leeward and Wi ...

''. It was returned to ''Temu'' after a phylogenetic analyses of tribe Mytreae found ''Blepharocalyx'' to be polyphyletic.

Description

The plant grows to be 15 meters with a trunk diameter of approximately 50 centimeters. The bark is smooth and reddish brown. Leaves are oval-shaped, while the flowers are white and arranged in

inflorescences An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphology (biology), Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of sperma ...

. Fruits are round, dark brown with hints of reddish tone, and taste bitter. The

toponym Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of '' toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...

Temuco (city in

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

) comes from this tree, meaning in mapuzungun "Temu water" or "temu in the water" ("co" means water in Mapuche).

References

cruckshanksii Near threatened plants Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Taxobox binomials not recognized by IUCN {{Myrtaceae-stub