Afrocarpus falcatus

(Thunb.) C.N. Page 1989

Common names

Outeniqua yellowwood (Palmer 1972), Outeniekwa geelhout [Afrikaans], Mogôbagôba [Sepedi], Umkhoba [IsiXhosa], Umsonti [IsiZulu] (DWAF 2006).

Taxonomic notes

Syn: Taxus falcata Thunb. 1800; Podocarpus falcatus (Thunb.) Endl. 1847; Nageia falcata (Thunb.) Carr. 1869; Decussocarpus falcatus (Thunb.) de Laub. 1969 (Farjon 1998).

Description

"Tall tree generally 10-25 m high but attaining a height of 60 m with a clean bole of more than 20 m and a girth of about 7 m. Bark greyish to purplish, more or less smooth and persistent in young trees, flaking in rectangular to roundish pieces in older specimens. Branchlets terete or square (on juvenile specimens generally square), distinctly ridged by decurrent leaf bases. Terminal buds about 1 mm in diameter; outer bud scales very narrowly triangular, 2-2.5 mm long and about 1 mm wide. Leaves spirally arranged, on branchlets of juvenile specimens often subopposite, spreading to suberect, glaucous to yellowish-green, twisted at the base and lamina thus orientated in a more or less vertical plane, narrowly linear-lanceolate to linear-elliptic, falcate to straight, acute to obtuse; adult leaves (1-) 2-4 (-4.5) cm long and (1.2-) 2-4 (-6) mm wide; juvenile leaves up to 12 cm long and 0.6 cm wide; midrib slightly raised on lower surface, very slightly raised on upper surface; stomata present on both surfaces, arranged in 14-20 ± distinct longitudinal lines on either side of midrib. Male cones solitary or in groups of 2-4, subsessile to very shortly stalked, 5-13 mm long, elongating up to 15 mm after shedding pollen, (2-) 3 (-3.5) mm in diameter, brownish; outer sterile scales at base very broadly triangular-trullate to very broadly obovate, crenulate to denticulate, 0.5-1 mm long and 1-1.5 mm wide; terminal lobe of fertile scales very broadly triangular-trullate, 0.6-0.8 mm long and 0.8-1.4 mm wide, crenulate to lacerate; pollen sacs 0.6-0.7 mm long and about 0.3-0.4 mm in diameter. Female cones solitary on scaly or leafy branches 7-27 mm long and 1.5-2.5 mm in diameter, widest at the top just below seed; only the terminal scale fertile. Seed subspherical to obovoid, (1.2-) 1.3-1.7 (-1.8) cm long, glaucous to greyish-green, ripening to a yellowish or light reddish-brown colour; testa consisting of outer somewhat fleshy covering up to 3 mm thick which becomes very resinous inwards, and inside this a subspherical, somewhat laterally compressed tubercled kernel 1-1.2 (-1.4) cm long with hard woody walls (0.8-) 1-1.7 (-2) mm thick" (Leistner 1966).

Range

South Africa. "This, the tallest member of the genus in Southern Africa, occurs in coastal and montane forests from the Swellendam district in the Cape to the northern Transvaal and southern Mozambique. It is much less common than P. latifolius and apparently is only rarely dominant" (Leistner 1966).

Big tree

This species includes the largest known podocarps outside of New Zealand (where Podocarpus totara is substantially larger, while Dacrycarpus dacrydioides and Dacrydium cupressinum are taller but more slender). Some of the largest trees in South Africa have been designated by the Department of Water and Forests as Champion Trees. They include the following:

• The "Tsitsikamma Big Tree," dbh 313 cm, height 39 m, and crown spread 37.5 m (Robert Van Pelt, 2003 measurements, unpub. data). This very well-known tree, visited by thousands of tourists every year, is located in the Plaatbos Nature Reserve, Storms River State Forest, Storms River, Eastern Cape (DWAF 2006).
• The "King Edward VII Tree," Diepwalle State Forest, Knysna, Western Cape. This is the largest accessible tree of the species (DWAF 2006).
• The "Woodville Big Tree," another often-visited tree located at 33.934°S, 22.645°E in the Bergplaas State Forest, Collins' Hoek, Western Cape (DWAF 2006).
• The "Eastern Monarch," located next to the Tyume hiking trail in Auckland Nature Reserve, Keiskamma State Forest, Eastern Cape (DWAF 2006).

One of the most remarkable of the big trees is the tree in Ethiopia named Awliyaw. This is a good name for a tree; it is an Arabic word meaning "trusted one," and is customarily used to refer to Islamic elders. Pankhurst (2000) relates a visit to this tree in about 1999. He states that he measured the tree as having a girth of 12.7 meters, but does not state whether this is measured at breast height. He also assigns it a height of 63 m and an age of 700 years, both statements without any supporting data. Still, it would be interesting to learn how large this tree really is. It is described as being located in southern Wello, in a tiny forest (53 ha) called Anabe, 30 km to the W of the town of Gerba, which is on the Kombolcha - Bati road. If anyone has the opportunity, please check it out and let me know what you find.

Oldest

Dendrochronology

Ethnobotany

Observations

See Big tree for some specific locations. A. falcatus is a fairly common tree in its native range, and I have seen it as an occasional ornamental in New South Wales and southern California.

Remarks

Monkeys and birds are reported to eat the fruit (Leistner 1966).

Citations

Department of Water and Forests. 2006.12.06. National Forests Act (8411998): Declaration of particular trees and particular group of trees "Champion Trees" under section 12 (1) (a)a nd (b) of the Act. Government Gazette 29452: 3--5. Available: http://www2.dwaf.gov.za/webapp/index.php?page_id=95, accessed 2008.09.12.

Leistner, O.A. 1966. Podocarpaceae. Pp. 34-41 in L.E. Codd, B. De Winter and H.B. Rycrodt (eds.), Flora of Southern Africa, Volume I. Republic of South Africa Department on Agricultural Technical Services (as P. falcatus).

See also