''Araucaria hunsteinii'' (Klinki, Klinkii or "Klinky", native names Rassu and Pai) is a species of ''

Araucaria ''Araucaria'' (; original pronunciation: .ɾawˈka. ɾja is a genus of evergreen coniferous trees in the family Araucariaceae. While today they are largely confined to the Southern Hemisphere, during the Jurassic and Cretaceous they were glo ...

'' native to the mountains of

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...

. It is threatened by

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss or habitat reduction) occurs when a natural habitat is no longer able to support its native species. The organisms once living there have either moved elsewhere, or are dead, leading to a decrease ...

Description

It is a very large

evergreen In botany, an evergreen is a plant which has Leaf, foliage that remains green and functional throughout the year. This contrasts with deciduous plants, which lose their foliage completely during the winter or dry season. Consisting of many diffe ...

tree (the tallest in

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

, and the tallest species in its family), growing to tall, exceptionally to , with a trunk up to diameter. The branches are horizontal, produced in whorls of five or six. The

leaves A leaf (: leaves) is a principal appendage of the stem of a vascular plant, usually borne laterally above ground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, stem, ...

are spirally arranged, scale-like or awl-like, long and broad at the base, with a sharp tip; leaves on young trees are shorter (under ) and narrower (under ). It is usually

monoecious Monoecy (; adj. monoecious ) is a sexual system in seed plants where separate male and female cones or flowers are present on the same plant. It is a monomorphic sexual system comparable with gynomonoecy, andromonoecy and trimonoecy, and contras ...

with male and female

cones In geometry, a cone is a three-dimensional figure that tapers smoothly from a flat base (typically a circle) to a point not contained in the base, called the ''apex'' or '' vertex''. A cone is formed by a set of line segments, half-lines, ...

on the same tree; the pollen cones are long and slender, up to long and broad; the seed cones are oval, up to long and broad. The seed cones disintegrate at maturity to release the numerous long nut-like

seed In botany, a seed is a plant structure containing an embryo and stored nutrients in a protective coat called a ''testa''. More generally, the term "seed" means anything that can be Sowing, sown, which may include seed and husk or tuber. Seeds ...

Cultivation and uses

It is a fast-growing tree, and is being tested as a potentially important

timber Lumber is wood that has been processed into uniform and useful sizes (dimensional lumber), including beams and planks or boards. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, window frames). ...

crop in tropical highland climates.

Pests

''Barinae'' spp., '' Setomorpha rutella'', Microlepidopteras, ''Cacatua galerita'' (the

Sulphur-crested cockatoo The sulphur-crested cockatoo (''Cacatua galerita'') is a relatively large white cockatoo found in wooded habitats in Australia, New Guinea, and some of the islands of Indonesia. They can be locally very numerous, leading to them sometimes being ...

) are pests of

pine nut Pine nuts, also called piñón (), pinoli (), or pignoli, are the edible seeds of pines (family Pinaceae, genus ''Pinus''). According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, only 29 species provide edible nuts, while 20 are traded locall ...

production in ''A. hunsteinii''. ''C. galerita'' may cause half of the seed crop to be lost in a year, mostly by trying to eat cones that are not yet ready. Another source describes ''A. hunsteinii'' as suffering few pests ''in plantations'' and therefore substituting ''A. cunninghamii'' in plantations with more pests.

References

* * *Howcroft, N. H. S. (1978). Data sheets on species undergoing genetic impoverishment: Araucaria hunsteinii. ''Forest Genetics Resources Information'' 8: 31–37. *Russo, R. O., & Briscoe, C. B. (2002). Performance of Klinki (''Araucaria hunsteinii'' K. Schuman) in the Humid Tropics of Costa Rica. ''Journal of Sustainable Forestry'' 14 (4): 13–18. {{Taxonbar, from=Q136739 hunsteinii Flora of New Guinea Flora of Papua New Guinea Near threatened plants Taxonomy articles created by Polbot