Foliage, pollen cones & seeds of C. arizonica var. stephensonii [C.J. Earle].
Common Names
Arizona or roughbark Arizona cypress (3), ciprés (2).Taxonomic notes
Syn: C. glabra Sudw. (1). Five varieties: arizonica , glabra , montana , nevadensis and stephensonii . The varieties are recognized on the basis of distribution and foliage, cone and bark characters. The recent Flora of North America (4) does not recognize any varieties; at the other extreme, each of the varieties was first described as a distinct species. See Little 1966 , Little 1970 , Silba 1981 , and Wolf 1948 for details.Description
"Trees to 23 m, shrubby where subject to fires; crown conic at first, broadly columnar with age, dense. Bark smooth at first, remaining so or becoming rough, furrowed, fibrous. Branchlets decussate, 1.3-2.3 mm diam. Leaves usually with conspicuous, pitlike, abaxial gland that produces drop of resin, often highly glaucous. Pollen cones 2-5 × 2 mm; pollen sacs mostly 4-6. Seed cones globose or oblong, mostly 2-3 cm, gray or brown, often glaucous at first; scales mostly 3-4 pairs, smooth or with scattered resin blisters, sometimes with erect conic umbos to 4 mm, especially on apical scales. Seeds mostly 4-6 mm, light tan to dark brown, not glaucous to heavily glaucous. 2 n = 22" (4).Range
USA: S California, SE and C Arizona, SW New Mexico, Texas; Mexico: Baja California Norte and Sonora; at 750 to 2450 metres in canyons, mountains, piñon-juniper woodland, and chaparral (2, 4, 5). See also (7).Big Tree
Oldest
Dendrochronology
Has been used in one ecological study (6), but no other applications are recorded.Ethnobotany
Observations
See the respective varieties.Remarks
Citations
(1) Vidakovic 1991 .(2) Elmore & Janish 1976 .
(3) Peattie 1950 .
(4) Eckenwalder, James E. at the Flora of North America web site .
(5) Little 1970 .
(6) Parker, A.J. 1980. The successional status of Cupressus arizonica. Great Basin Naturalist 40(3): 254-264.
(7) Robert S. Thompson, Katherine H. Anderson and Patrick J. Bartlein. 1999. Atlas of Relations Between Climatic Parameters and Distributions of Important Trees and Shrubs in North America. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1650 A&B. URL= http://greenwood.cr.usgs.gov/pub/ppapers/p1650-a/pages/conifers.html, accessed 22-Jan-2000.
See also:
Silba 1986
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Vascular Plant Image Gallery
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This page is from the Gymnosperm Database
URL: http://www.geocities.com/~earlecj/cu/cup/arizonica.htm
Edited by Christopher J. Earle
E-mail:
earlecj@earthlink.com
Last modified on 22-Jan-2000