Callitris canescens

(Parl.) S.T.Blake (1959)

Common names

Morrison's cypress pine, scrubby cypress pine.

Taxonomic notes

Syn: Frenella canescens Parl. ex D.C. (Farjon 2010).

This species is sister to C. oblonga, with a latter Miocene date for the most recent common ancestor (Larter et al. 2017).

Description

Shrubs or small trees to 6 m tall, usually with a short, branching trunk and a pyramidal to irregular crown of ascending, contorted branches. Bark grey, first wrinkled, becoming scaly and flaking. Twigs numerous, slender, round, 0.6-0.7 mm diameter, covered with appressed leaves in alternating whorls of 3, linear, 1.5-3 × 1 mm, stomata only present near leaf margins, with a granulate outer surface. Pollen cones terminal, numerous, ovoid, 1.5-2 mm long, yellow-green, each with 9-12 microsporophylls. Seed cones terminal on thickened twigs, solitary or aggregated, globose, 12-15 mm diameter, light brown turning gray, with 2 alternate whorls of 3 scales bearing almost entirely included bracts, with 3-6 blackish brown seeds per scale (Farjon 2010).

Distribution and Ecology

Australia: Western Australia and South Australia (Farjon 1998). Occurs at elevations of 250-380 m on varied soils, in a summer-dry climate. Commonly found in kwongan (dwarf scrubland) with species of Myrtaceae and Proteaceae shrubs, or in mallee scrub with with Acacia, Eucalyptus and other Proteaceae; often on disturbed sites such as rights-of-way (Farjon 2010).

Zone 10 (cold hardiness limit between -1°C and +4.4°C) (Bannister and Neuner 2001).

Remarkable Specimens

No data as of 2026-01-27.

Ethnobotany

No data as of 2026-01-27.

Observations

No data as of 2026-01-27.

Remarks

The epithet "canescens" means "gray" and may refer to the seed cones (Farjon 2010).

Citations

Blake, S. T. 1959. Proceedings of the Royal Society of Queensland 70:39.

Larter, Maximilian, Sebastian Pfautsch, Jean-Christophe Domec, Santiago Trueba, Nathalie Nagalingum, and Sylvain Delzon. 2017. Aridity drove the evolution of extreme embolism resistance and the radiation of conifer genus Callitris. New Phytologist 215(1):97–112. https://doi.org/10.1111/nph.14545.

See also

Farjon (2005) provides a detailed account, with illustrations.