Podocarpus pilgeri

Foxw. ex Merrill (1907)

Common names

Bempop [Hattam, in W New Guinea]; gihura, imaugang jamega, kaibeltugl, kebu, monopana, puling, sosumehi, sula, yamga, yazib [various languages in E New Guinea] (de Laubenfels 1998).

Taxonomic notes

Synonymy: see POWO.

This species has been found to be sister to P. decipiens and P. degeneri in the only molecular study to date that has evaluated essentially all taxa in Podocarpus (Khan et al. 2023).

Description

"Trees up to 25 m, or shrub, bole up to 13 m, d.b.h. up to 43 cm. Outer bark red, dark brown, or pale brown, smooth, fibrous or scaly, sometimes shallowly fissured. Inner bark salmon pink or pale brown. Wood orange yellow, reddish brown, straw to dark brown, light brown. Branches scattered or in whorls. Branchlets slender, terete. Terminal buds ovoid or conoid, 3.5-4.5 by 3-5 mm, scales narrowly triangular-ovate to ovate-lanceolate, 3-4.5 mm long, acute or long-acuminate, crested. Leaves pale green, sometimes glaucous below, young ones reddish, scattered or sometimes crowded at tip of branchlets, broadly linear-lanceolate to elliptic, or oblong, 1.5-8 by 0.4-1.3 cm, abruptly or rather gradually narrowed and acute or apiculate at tip, rarely obtusely apiculate or mucronate, or rounded, at base cuneate to narrowly so, midrib narrow and prominent above, crested below, flat or grooved, margin usually flat or entire leaf V-shaped in cross section; thin to very thick coriaceous, patent, glabrous. Male cones light yellow, solitary, axillary, cylindric or ovoid-globose, 1.5-5 by 0.2-0.4 mm, subsessile, scales at base of cone ovate-triangular, 1.5-3 mm long, acute, microsporophylls (, broadly triangular or ovate, 1-1.5 mm long, apiculate or obtuse, margin scarious, anther-sacs ellipsoid or globose, 1 mm across. Female cones solitary, axillary, peduncle 3-12 mm long, slender, receptacle red or purple, composed of 2 fused fleshy bracts, 5-12 by 3-7 mm, fertile ones obtuse, sterile ones acute, subtended by a pair of subulate, 1.5-2 mm long bracts, ovule reddish brown or red. Seeds purple, glaucous, ellipsoid-ovoid, 8-8.5 by 6-7 mm, obtuse" (Van Royen 1979).

Distribution and Ecology

Cambodia; China (Hainan, Yunnan, Guangxi, Guangdong); Indonesia (Papua, Maluku, Sulawesi); Laos; Malaysia (Sarawak); Papua New Guinea (Bismarck Archipelago, Papua New Guinea (main island group)); Philippines; Thailand; Viet Nam.

Remarkable Specimens

No data as of 2023.02.23.

Ethnobotany

No data as of 2023.02.23.

Observations

No data as of 2023.02.23.

Remarks

The epithet honors conifer botanist Robert Knud Friedrich Pilger (1876-1953).

Citations

Khan, R., Hill, R. S., Liu, J., and Biffin, E. 2023. Diversity, distribution, systematics and conservation status of Podocarpaceae. Plants 12(5):1171. https://doi.org/10.3390/plants12051171.

Merrill, Elmer D. 1907. The flora of Mount Halcon, Mindoro. Philippine Journal of Science 2(4):259. Online at Google Books.

See also

de Laubenfels 1988.

Gray, Netta E. 1958. A Taxonomic Revision of Podocarpus, XI. The South Pacific Species of Section Podocarpus, Subsection B. Journal of the Arnold Arboretum 39:459. Available: Biodiversity Heritage Library, accessed 2023.01.08.

Hiep et al. 2004.

Luu and Thomas 2004 provide a description, range map, conservation status, drawings and photos, and a wealth of additional information.