Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants - Online edition

Diploglottis alaticarpa W.E.Cooper


Tree
Click/tap on images to enlarge
Fruit, base view, dehisced, and arillous seeds, seeds with aril removed. © W.T. Cooper.
Cotyledon stage, hypogeal germination. © CSIRO
10th leaf stage. © CSIRO
Family

Cooper, W.E. (2014) Austrobaileya 9(2): 199-201. Type: Queensland. Cook District: Southern side of Palmerston Highway near Mamu Boardwalk, Wooroonooran National Park [west of Innisfail], 19 December 2013, W.Cooper 2232 & R.Jensen.

Stem

Tree to 22 m, monoecious, dbh to 40 cm; trunk not fluted, lacking distinctive features.

Leaves

Leafy twigs shallowly ribbed, minutely lenticellate, glabrous; new growth silvery-pink and sericeous. Leaflet blades about 4.4-18.5 x 1.8-6.3 cm, leaflet stalks 0.7-2.5 cm long. Midrib virtually flat, leaflet stalk slightly grooved on the upper surface. Lateral veins about 8-15 on each side of the midrib, curving inside the black margin but not forming definite loops.

Flowers

Inflorescence pale, sericeous hairy, rachis ribbed. Young inflorescence bracts 4-22 x 1-4 mm. Flowers about 2.3-5.3 mm diameter. Calyx shortly cupular, lobes five, ca. 2 mm long and wide, both sides hairy. Petals five. Disk +/- surrounding the ovary, glabrous. Stamens seven or eight.

Fruit

Fruit yellowish-green and blushed with pink, +/- sparsely and minutely hairy, with sutures winged in basal half, wings 2.5-4 mm wide. Seeds laterally compressed, about 14-26 x 16-22 mm wide, nearly or completely enveloped by the orange-red aril.

Seedlings

Seed germination time 13 to 17 days. First pair of true leaves lanceolate to elliptic, opposite or sub-opposite. Midrib raised on the upper surface. At the tenth leaf stage: leaf blade elliptic, apex acuminate, +/- glabrous on both the upper and lower surfaces; lateral veins form loops inside the margin of the leaf blade; midrib raised on the upper surface. Terminal bud, petiole and stem clothed in very short hairs. Stem longitudinally grooved.

Distribution and Ecology

Endemic to NEQ, restricted mostly to Wooroonooran National Park, west of Innisfail. Altitudinal range from 100 to 362 m. Grows as an understorey tree in well developed rain forest.

RFK Code

1272

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