''Hicksbeachia'' is a genus of two species of trees in the family

Proteaceae The Proteaceae form a family (biology), family of flowering plants predominantly distributed in the Southern Hemisphere. The family comprises 83 genus, genera with about 1,660 known species. Australia and South Africa have the greatest concentr ...

. They are native to rainforests of northern

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

and southeastern

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia. They are commonly known as red bopple nut or beef nut due to the bright red colour of their fruits.

Taxonomy

Ferdinand von Mueller Baron Sir Ferdinand Jacob Heinrich von Mueller, (; 30 June 1825 – 10 October 1896) was a German-Australian physician, geographer, and most notably, a botanist. He was appointed government botanist for the then colony of Victoria, Australia ...

named the genus in 1883 in honour of Michael Hicks Beach who had been

Secretary of State for the Colonies The secretary of state for the colonies or colonial secretary was the Cabinet of the United Kingdom's government minister, minister in charge of managing certain parts of the British Empire. The colonial secretary never had responsibility for t ...

. Mueller named several genera, including '' Buckinghamia'', ''

Cardwellia ''Cardwellia'' is a monotypic genus (i.e. a genus that contains only one species) in the protea and macadamia family Proteaceae. The sole described species is ''Cardwellia sublimis'' − commonly known as northern silky oak or bull oak − whic ...

'', '' Carnarvonia'' and ''

Hollandaea ''Hollandaea'' is a small genus of plants in the family Proteaceae containing four species of Australian rainforest trees. All four species are endemic to restricted areas of the Wet Tropics of northeast Queensland. Naming and classification Th ...

'', after Colonial Secretaries of the time. He described the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

'' Hicksbeachia pinnatifolia'' at the time. The genus was considered monotypic until Peter Weston split the north Queensland population as a separate species '' H. pilosa'' in 1988. Molecular and morphological analysis shows this genus is most closely related to the genus ''

Bleasdalea ''Bleasdalea'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Proteaceae. Taxonomy Molecular and morphological analysis shows this genus is most closely related to the genus '' Hicksbeachia'', ancestors of the two genera having diverged around 15 ...

'', ancestors of the two genera having diverged around 15 million years ago in the

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...

. Furthermore, the common ancestor of these genera is thought to have arisen in South America around 35 million years ago in the

Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch (geology), epoch of the Paleogene Geologic time scale, Period that extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that defin ...

, leaving other branches diversifying into ''

Gevuina ''Gevuina avellana'', commonly known as the Chilean hazelnut ( in Spanish) or Gevuina hazelnut, is an evergreen tree growing up to 20 meters (65 feet) tall. It is the only species currently classified in the genus ''Gevuina''. It is native to s ...

'' and ''

Euplassa ''Euplassa'' is a genus of flowering plants in the protea family. It is native to tropical South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller ...

''. Pollen which bears a strong resemblance to the living ''Gevuina'' and ''Hicksbeachia'' has been recovered from mid

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...

through to

Eocene The Eocene ( ) is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (Ma). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes ...

deposits from the northern

Antarctic Peninsula The Antarctic Peninsula, known as O'Higgins Land in Chile and Tierra de San Martin in Argentina, and originally as Graham Land in the United Kingdom and the Palmer Peninsula in the United States, is the northernmost part of mainland Antarctica. ...

, and from late Cretaceous deposits in the

Otway Basin The Otway Basin is a northwest trending sedimentary basin located along the southern coast of Australia. The basin covers an area of 150,000 square kilometers and spans from southeastern South Australia to southwestern Victoria, with 80% lying o ...

in Western Victoria. Leaf cuticles comparable to ''Hicksbeachia'' have been recovered from the Miocene

Manuherikia Group The Manuherikia Group is a fluvial- lacustrine sedimentary fill in the Central Otago area of New Zealand, at the site of the prehistoric Lake Manuherikia. The area consists of a valley and ridge topography, with a series of schist-greywacke moun ...

of Central Otago in New Zealand's

South Island The South Island ( , 'the waters of Pounamu, Greenstone') is the largest of the three major islands of New Zealand by surface area, the others being the smaller but more populous North Island and Stewart Island. It is bordered to the north by ...

Species

*'' Hicksbeachia pilosa'' *'' Hicksbeachia pinnatifolia'' Neither of the two species is common. ''H. pinnatifolia'' is the one more commonly grown, due to its edible nuts.Huxley, A., ed. (1992). ''New RHS Dictionary of Gardening''. Macmillan .

Description

Both species are small single-trunked trees reaching a maximum height of . Their leaves are

pinnate Pinnation (also called pennation) is the arrangement of feather-like or multi-divided features arising from both sides of a common axis. Pinnation occurs in biological morphology, in crystals, such as some forms of ice or metal crystals, and ...

in shape and arranged alternately along the branches. The flowers are arranged in drooping

inflorescence In botany, an inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a plant's Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a system of branches. An inflorescence is categorized on the basis of the arrangement of flowers on a mai ...

s, and emit strong odours around nightfall, which have been likened to honey, sour milk, cat's urine, or mice.

Distribution and habitat

Both species are found in rainforest in eastern Australia. ''H. pinnatifolia'' is found in northeastern New South Wales and southeastern Queensland, and ''H. pilosa'' is found in the Wet Tropics rainforests of northeastern Queensland.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q5751433 Macadamieae Proteaceae genera Proteales of Australia Trees of Australia Flora of Queensland Flora of New South Wales