''Laurelia sempervirens'' is a species of

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 in the family

Atherospermataceae The Atherospermataceae, commonly known as the southern sassafrases, are a family (biology), family of broadleaf evergreen trees and shrubs. The family includes 14 species in seven genus, genera. The atherosperms are today mostly distributed in th ...

(formerly

Monimiaceae The Monimiaceae is a family (biology), family of flowering plants in the magnoliid Order (biology), order Laurales.Peter F. Stevens (2001 onwards). "Monimiaceae" At: Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. At: Botanical Databases At: Missouri Botanical Gar ...

). Common names include Peruvian nutmeg, tihue or trihue (from the

Mapuche language Mapuche ( , ; from 'land' and 'people', meaning 'the people of the land') or Mapudungun (from 'land' and 'speak, speech', meaning 'the speech of the land'; also spelled Mapuzugun and Mapudungu) is either a language isolate or member of the sm ...

), and Chilean laurel or Chilean sassafras. It is

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 ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

, occurring at 34–41° south latitude. It requires a warm subtropical to tropical climate that is cool but also frost-free or with only very slight winter frosts not below , with high summer heat, rainfall and humidity. It grows best on well-drained, slightly acidic

soil Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, water, and organisms that together support the life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from ''soil'' by re ...

s rich in organic matter. This is typical

laurel forest Laurel forest, also called laurisilva or laurissilva, is a type of subtropical forest found in areas with high humidity and relatively stable, mild temperatures. The forest is characterized by broadleaf tree species with evergreen, glossy and el ...

habitat. However, the southern hemisphere genus ''

Laurelia ''Laurelia'' is a genus of plant in the major group Angiosperms (flowering plants) in the family Atherospermataceae, or formerly Monimiaceae. It contains only two species, both endemic to the southern hemisphere, an example of Gondwanan distribu ...

'' is not closely related to the laurels (

Lauraceae Lauraceae, or the laurels, is a plant Family (biology), family that includes the bay laurel, true laurel and its closest relatives. This family comprises about 2850 known species in about 45 genus (biology), genera worldwide. They are dicotyled ...

), despite the similarity. The tree is known as ''triwe'' in

Huilliche The Huilliche (), Huiliche or Huilliche-Mapuche are the southern partiality of the Mapuche macroethnic group in Chile and Argentina. Located in the Zona Sur, they inhabit both Futahuillimapu ("great land of the south") and, as the Cunco or Ve ...

and ''laurel'' in Spanish. It is the ritual tree of the

Huilliche people The Huilliche (), Huiliche or Huilliche-Mapuche are the southern partiality of the Mapuche macroethnic group in Chile and Argentina. Located in the Zona Sur, they inhabit both Futahuillimapu ("great land of the south") and, as the Cunco or Ve ...

Futahuillimapu Futahuillimapu, or Fütawillimapu, is a traditional territory of the Huilliche people. Futahuillimapu spans the land between Bueno River and Reloncaví Sound. Futahuillimapu means "great land of the south". Back in the 18th century when this ter ...

Description

The tihue is a large (up to tall and in diameter) evergreen tree with smooth, pale yellow bark. The bark cracks when ageing, coming off in roughly circular plates. The wood and the leaves are strongly aromatic. The bright green leaves are arranged in opposite pairs, and are oblong in shape, narrowed at the base. The leaves are leathery, shiny, long and wide. The serrated edges of the leaves help to distinguish this tree from the closely related ''

Laureliopsis philippiana ''Laureliopsis'' is a genus of flowering plants with just one species, ''Laureliopsis philippiana'', known as tepa and wawán, endemic to Chile and the narrow neighboring strip of Argentina (35 to 45°S). In Chile it is found from Maule Region, M ...

'', which has more deeply toothed leaf margins. The tihue bears bundles of small yellow unisexual flowers, both male and female on every tree (monoecious). The fruit is a greenish achene with seeds bearing feathery anemophilous filaments. The seed is dispersed by the wind (

anemochory In spermatophyte plants, seed dispersal is the movement, spread or transport of seeds away from the parent plant. Plants have limited mobility and rely upon a variety of dispersal vectors to transport their seeds, including both abiotic vectors, ...

Cultivation and uses

Its

wood Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin t ...

is pale yellow in colour, with a fine and homogeneous texture: the

growth rings Dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) is the scientific method of chronological dating, dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed in a tree. As well as dating them, this can give data for dendroclimatology, ...

are not conspicuous. The tree 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 ...

. It has been introduced into

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

and into

Cornwall Cornwall (; or ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is also one of the Celtic nations and the homeland of the Cornish people. The county is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, ...

and planted in

Sussex Sussex (Help:IPA/English, /ˈsʌsɪks/; from the Old English ''Sūþseaxe''; lit. 'South Saxons'; 'Sussex') is an area within South East England that was historically a kingdom of Sussex, kingdom and, later, a Historic counties of England, ...

in the UK. The leaves of ''Laurelia sempervirens'' were used by

Mapuche The Mapuche ( , ) also known as Araucanians are a group of Indigenous peoples of the Americas, Indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina, including parts of Patagonia. The collective term refers to a wide-ranging e ...

Amerindians for treating headache and as a diuretic.

References

''Laurelia sempervirens'' in Encyclopedia of Chilean Flora
* ttp://www.ibiblio.org/pfaf/cgi-bin/arr_html?Laurelia+sempervirens Plants for a future database: ''Laurelia sempervirens''. - British commentary on this tree.

External links

{{Taxonbar, from=Q1002397 Atherospermataceae Endemic flora of Chile Flora of central Chile Trees of Chile Near threatened plants Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Taxa named by José Antonio Pavón Jiménez Taxa named by Hipólito Ruiz López