Flora of North America species comparison

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Casuarina glauca

Casuarinaceae

Brazilian beefwood, gray she-oak, scaly-bark beefwood, suckering Australian-pine, swamp she-oak

casuarina family, she-oak family
Habit Trees, 8-20 m, frequently producing root suckers. Trees [or shrubs], evergreen.
Bark

gray-brown, finely fissured and scaly.

Branchlets

drooping;

segments 8-20 × 0.9-1.2 mm, glabrous, occasionally waxy;

longitudinal ridges flat to slightly rounded-convex;

teeth usually marcescent, 12-17, erect, 0.6-0.9 mm.

Leaves

reduced to small teeth in whorls of [4-]6-17 at apex of each segment of photosynthetic branchlets.
Inflorescences

of alternating whorls of flowers, each flower subtended by toothlike bract and 2 bracteoles, bracteoles usually persistent, lateral, scalelike; staminate inflorescences catkinlike spikes, short to elongate; pistillate inflorescences heads, globular to ovoid.
Flowers

unisexual, staminate and pistillate on different plants.

unisexual, staminate and pistillate on same or different plants.
Staminate flowers

sepals deciduous at anthesis, 1-2, hooded, scalelike;

stamen 1;

anthers basifixed, 2-locular.
Pistillate flowers

perianth absent;

pistil 1, compound, 2-carpellate, 1 fertile, the other usually reduced or absent;

ovules 2, an additional 2 abortive ovules in reduced carpel;

styles 2-branched, reddish.
Infructescences

rust-colored to white-pubescent, becoming glabrous;

peduncles 3-12 mm;

infructescence body 9-18 × 7-9 mm;

bracteoles broadly acute.

± woody, cylindric, conelike;

floral bracteoles 2, enlarged as lateral valves.
Fruits

compressed, winged nuts (samaras).
Seeds

1 in each samara.
Young

permanent shoots with long-recurved teeth.

Staminate

spikes 1.2-4 cm, 7-10 whorls per cm;

anthers ca. 0.8 mm.

Samaras

3.5-5 mm.

Photosynthetic

branchlets slender, wiry, with several very short, basal segments and 1-numerous elongate segments;

segments terete [quadrangular], with as many longitudinal ridges as leaves;

ridges separated by furrows containing stomates.

Casuarina glauca

Casuarinaceae
Habitat Commonly near brackish water
Elevation 0-50 m (0-200 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
FL; native; e coast Australia [Introduced in North America]
[BONAP county map]
Tropical and subtropical dry regions; warm temperate areas
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Commonly near brackish water; 0-50 m; introduced; Fla.; native, e coast Australia.

Casuarina glauca is widely cultivated in many parts of the world. Pistillate trees are very infrequent in the flora.

It is now considered a pest species in Florida because of root suckering. Its identification may be confused by the practice of some Florida nurserymen of grafting scions of Casuarina glauca onto rootstocks from the other two species.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Genera 4, species 90 (1 genus, 3 species in the flora).

Casuarinaceae are occasionally referred to as the beefwood family or the Australian-pine family.

Species have been cultivated in the warmest parts of the flora as ornamentals and shelterbelts, and for sand binding. Their suitability for such uses is partly because of the presence in root nodules of actinomycetes (Frankia); such actinomycetes are effective in fixation of atmospheric nitrogen. Vesicular-arbuscular, endotrophic mycorrhizae have also been reported. In addition to the species described here, the following have all been recorded as cultivated in the flora, but they are not known to be naturalized: Allocasuarina decussata (Bentham) L. A. S. Johnson, A. helmsii (Ewart & M. Gordon) L. A. S. Johnson, A. littoralis (Salisbury) L. A. S. Johnson (Casuarina suberosa Otto & Dietrich), A. torulosa (Aiton) L. A. S. Johnson, A. verticillata (Lamarck) L. A. S. Johnson (C. stricta Aiton), C. cristata Miquel (C. lepidophloia F. Mueller) and Gymnostoma sumatranum (Junghuhn ex de Vriese) L. A. S. Johnson (C. sumatrana Junghuhn ex de Vriese). See K. L. Wilson and L. A. S. Johnson (1989) for distinguishing features of the Australian species.

Dried specimens differ significantly from fresh material. When fresh, fruiting bracteoles of the infructescence are nearly always appressed to each other, enclosing the samara; when the infructescence dries out, the bracteoles separate. Measurements given here for infructescence body diameter do not include any portion of the bracteoles extending beyond the main body of the infructescence. The softer tissues of branchlets contract when dried, so that features such as angularity or convexity of longitudinal ridges are emphasized in dried specimens. The key and descriptions are generally based on dried

specimens.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Source FNA vol. 3. FNA vol. 3, p. 539. Author: Karen L. Wilson.
Parent taxa Casuarinaceae > Casuarina
Sibling taxa
C. cunninghamiana, C. equisetifolia
Subordinate taxa
Name authority Sieber ex Sprengel: Syst. Veg. 3: 803. (1826) R. Brown
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Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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