''Hopea subalata'' or locally known as Merawan Kanching or Giam Kanching is a species of

plant Plants are the eukaryotes that form the Kingdom (biology), kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly Photosynthesis, photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with c ...

in the family

Dipterocarpaceae Dipterocarpaceae is a family (biology), family of flowering plants with 22 genera and about 695 known species of mainly lowland tropical forest trees. Their distribution is pantropical, from northern South America to Africa, the Seychelles, India ...

. It is a tree

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

Peninsular Malaysia Peninsular Malaysia, historically known as Malaya and also known as West Malaysia or the Malaysian Peninsula, is the western part of Malaysia that comprises the southern part of the Malay Peninsula on Mainland Southeast Asia and the list of isla ...

where it is confined to

Selangor Selangor ( ; ), also known by the Arabic language, Arabic honorific Darul Ehsan, or "Abode of Sincerity", is one of the 13 states of Malaysia. It is on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia and is bordered by Perak to the north, Pahang to the e ...

Description

Hopea subalata is a small-sized tree that reaches to about 32 cm in diameter. This species is a hyper-endemic species which is known only from lowland dipterocarp forest of Kanching Forest Reserve in Selangor.

Etymology

The local name ''Kanching'' was named after its type locality of Kanching Forest Reserve in Selangor. ''Merawan'' is a Malay term for ''"as high as the clouds"'' to represent its height while ''Giam'' is a Malay term for ''"tree with hardwood trunks and branches"''.

Conservation effort

Although its timbers are not harvested commercially, it is still facing extinction issue due to its low population size and threats from urban development of nearby Rawang town. As of 2010s, there were only 400 trees of Hopea subalata remain in the forest reserve and the world. Due to this, the Rawang Bypass that was constructed through the forest area was redesigned into curvy structure to reduce extensive felling of trees, cutting and filling of slopes, and disruption of free flow of wildlife in the area. As further conservation effort, the tree is also being planted outside of its original area such as in an urban forest known as “Khazanah Rimba” in Pantai Eco Park, Kuala Lumpur.

References

subalata Endemic flora of Selangor Trees of Peninsular Malaysia Critically endangered flora of Asia Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Dipterocarpaceae-stub