Eucalypt is any woody plant with capsule fruiting bodies belonging to one of seven closely related genera (of the tribe Eucalypteae) found across

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

: ''

Eucalyptus ''Eucalyptus'' () is a genus of more than 700 species of flowering plants in the family Myrtaceae. Most species of ''Eucalyptus'' are trees, often Mallee (habit), mallees, and a few are shrubs. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalyp ...

'', ''

Corymbia ''Corymbia'', commonly known as bloodwoods, is a genus of about one hundred species of tree that, along with ''Eucalyptus'', '' Angophora'' and several smaller groups, are referred to as eucalypts. Until 1990, corymbias were included in the g ...

'', '' Angophora'', '' Stockwellia'', ''

Allosyncarpia ''Allosyncarpia ternata'', commonly known as ''an-binik'', is a species of rainforest trees constituting part of the botany, botanical family (biology), family Myrtaceae and included in the eucalypts group. The only species in its genus, it was S ...

'', '' Eucalyptopsis'' and '' Arillastrum''. In

, they are commonly known as gum trees or stringybarks.

Taxonomy

For an example of changing historical perspectives, in 1991, largely genetic evidence indicated that some prominent ''Eucalyptus'' species were actually more closely related to ''Angophora'' than to other eucalypts; they were accordingly split off into the new genus ''Corymbia''. Although separate, all of these genera and their species are allied and it remains the standard to refer to the members of all seven genera ''Angophora'', ''Corymbia'', ''Eucalyptus'', ''Stockwellia'', ''Allosyncarpia'', ''Eucalyptopsis'' and ''Arillastrum'' as "eucalypts" or as the eucalypt group. The extant genera ''Stockwellia'', ''Allosyncarpia'', ''Eucalyptopsis'' and ''Arillastrum'' comprise six known species, restricted to monsoon forests and rainforests in north-eastern Australia, the

Arnhem Land Arnhem Land is a historical region of the Northern Territory of Australia. It is located in the north-eastern corner of the territory and is around from the territorial capital, Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin. In 1623, Dutch East India Compa ...

plateau,

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 ...

, the Moluccas and

New Caledonia New Caledonia ( ; ) is a group of islands in the southwest Pacific Ocean, southwest of Vanuatu and east of Australia. Located from Metropolitan France, it forms a Overseas France#Sui generis collectivity, ''sui generis'' collectivity of t ...

. These genera are recognised as having evolved from ancient lineages of the family Myrtaceae. According to genetic, fossil and morphological evidence, it is hypothesised that they evolved into separate taxa before the evolution of the more widespread and well-known genera ''Eucalyptus'', ''Corymbia'' and ''Angophora'', and all of their many species. '' Eucalyptus deglupta'' has naturally spread the furthest from the Australian geographic origin of the genus ''Eucalyptus'', being the only species known growing naturally in the nearby northern hemisphere, from

New Britain New Britain () is the largest island in the Bismarck Archipelago, part of the Islands Region of Papua New Guinea. It is separated from New Guinea by a northwest corner of the Solomon Sea (or with an island hop of Umboi Island, Umboi the Dampie ...

Sulawesi Sulawesi ( ), also known as Celebes ( ), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the List of islands by area, world's 11th-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Min ...

, Seram Island to

Mindanao Mindanao ( ) is the List of islands of the Philippines, second-largest island in the Philippines, after Luzon, and List of islands by population, seventh-most populous island in the world. Located in the southern region of the archipelago, the ...

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

. '' Eucalyptus urophylla'' also grows naturally as far west as the Flores and

Timor Timor (, , ) is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, in the north of the Timor Sea. The island is Indonesia–Timor-Leste border, divided between the sovereign states of Timor-Leste in the eastern part and Indonesia in the ...

islands.

Adaptations

CSIRO ScienceImage 10646 Eucalypt regrowth after Black Saturday bushfires

Eucalypts from fire-prone habitats are attuned to withstand fire in several ways: * Their seeds are often held in an insulated capsule, which opens only after a bushfire. Once cooled down, the land becomes a freshly fertilised seed bed. * Oils in the leaves tend to make the fire more severe and therefore more damaging to less attuned species, giving an evolutionary advantage to the eucalypts. Epicormic buds under the often thick bark of the trunk and

branch A branch, also called a ramus in botany, is a stem that grows off from another stem, or when structures like veins in leaves are divided into smaller veins. History and etymology In Old English, there are numerous words for branch, includ ...

es are ready to sprout new stems and

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, ...

after a fire. These advantages work well in areas affected by long dry spells. Over 700 eucalypt species dominate landscapes all over Australia, but diversity is reduced in rainforests and arid environments. A fungal plant pathogen (from the family Sporocadaceae), '' Allelochaeta brevilata'' is found on species of eucalypts in Australia.

References

External links

Plant Guide: Eucalyptus, Corymbia and Angophora
at Australian Native Plants Society
Eucalypt Research
at Currency Creek Arboretum {{Commons category, Eucalyptus

Eucalypt Eucalypt is any woody plant with Capsule (fruit), capsule fruiting bodies belonging to one of seven closely related genera (of the tribe Eucalypteae) found across Australia: ''Eucalyptus'', ''Corymbia'', ''Angophora'', ''Stockwellia'', ''Allosyn ...

Myrtaceae Plant common names

Taxonomy

Adaptations

See also

References

External links