Beilschmiedia tooram (F.M.Bailey) B.Hyland

Hyland, B.P.M. (1989) Australian Systematic Botany 2: 156.

Walnut, Tooram; Walnut, Brown; Walnut, Coach; Tooram's Walnut; Tooram Walnut; Brown Walnut; Coach Walnut

A thin pale layer normally visible beneath the subrhytidome layer before the first section of the outer blaze.

Twigs terete, clothed in tortuous, erect, brown hairs. Leaf blades about 6.5-21 x 2.5-7 cm, green or slightly glaucous on the underside, clothed in tortuous, erect, brown hairs when young but almost glabrous when older. Midrib raised on the upper surface. Petioles flat or ridged on the upper surface. Oil dots visible with a lens. Young leaves pink-red and drooping.

Tepals about 0.5-1 mm long. Stamens six. Staminodes 0-3, not differentiated into heads and filaments. Ovary glabrous, +/- sessile.

Fruits globular, laterally compressed, 36-55 mm long, about 35-55 x 22-35 mm along the longer and shorter axes. Endocarp about 0.6-2 mm thick. Cotyledons cream or orange.

At the tenth leaf stage: leaf blade hairy on the upper surface at least along the midrib; oil dots small, visible only with a lens; numerous tortuous rusty brown hairs on the terminal buds, petioles and stem. Seed germination time 17 to 31 days.

Endemic to NEQ, restricted to the area between Cape Tribulation and Tully. Altitudinal range from 60-1080 m. Grows in well developed lowland and upland rain forest on a variety of sites.

Fallen fruit eaten by Cassowaries and Musky Rat-kangaroos. Cooper & Cooper (1994). This species scarcely grows large enough to produce millable logs but it has been included with a few other species under the Standard Trade Name of Brown Walnut. Wood specific gravity 0.85-0.97. Hyland (1989).