| Apollonias | |
|---|---|
| Apollonias barbujana, Canary Islands | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Magnoliids |
| Order: | Laurales |
| Family: | Lauraceae |
| Genus: | Apollonias Nees |
| species | |
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Apollonias is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the laurel family, Lauraceae. The genus includes from one to ten species of evergreen trees and shrubs from laurel forest habitat mainly in Macaronesian islands.
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Trees up to 6 m tall in Apollonias arnottii up to 25 m in height in Apollonias barbujana, which can be differentiated by their sheets oval, shiny dark green, edged somewhat revolute entire, without glands along the midrib and in some species often with galls produced by the bite of some bugs. Flowering is abundant, provided the flowers at clusters. The fruit s are ovoid and elongated with a short dome. At maturity acquiring a blackish color.
The leaves, which correspond mainly to the type "lauroide" (Sweet bay): wide, oval, leathery, glossy. Hence the Latin name given to the training: laurus. It are evergreen trees or shrubs with large, shiny, ovoid leaves. Native of open spots in the laurel forest habitats. Has become quite rare due to its fine, strong wood. Older specimens form dense racemes of small fragrant white flowers followed by one-seeded, olive-like brownish-green fruits, ripening to bluish-black.
Trees up to 6 m tall. Trunk and bark grey, brownish, lenticellate.Branchlets, glabrous. The leaves are simple, alternate, spiral, clustered at twig ends; petiole 0.5-1.2 cm, slightly canaliculate above, glabrous; lamina 8-18 x 1.7-3.8 cm, usually narrow elliptic, sometimes narrow oblanceolate, apex narrowly and gradually long acuminate, base acute to cuneate, margin entire, chartaceous, glabrous, slightly glaucous and sparsely puberulous beneath; midrib slightly canaliculate above; secondary_nerves 8-14 pairs, gradually curved and ascending; tertiary_nerves reticulo-percurrent. Inflorescences with flowers in axillary or subterminal racemes; pedicels filiform and long; anthers 2 celled. The fruit is a drupa, globose or ovoid, seated on the persistent perianth; The berry have one seed.
The species of Apollonias formed part of a clade consisting of Persea, represented by 6 species, Phoebe, Dehaasia and Alseodaphne, each represented by one species. Apollonias was isolated in a remote era of Persea and the current classification is not clear. Beilschmiedia is not having a closed affinity to Apollonias. Apollonias madagascariensis is now Beilschmiedia madagascariensis. Depending on circumscription; recent studies (e.g. Rohwer 1993, van der Werff 2003) have limited the genus to just one species, with the others transferred to Beilschmiedia. 16 species, subspecies, varieties, forms, or cultivars were in this genus. This genus was related with Beilschmiedia. Apollonias barbujana could be the only species but also it can be divided in several species. To date nomenclature is not clear.
Understorey trees in medium and high elevation wet evergreen forests, generally between 700 and 1800 m. Endemic to the Western_Ghats- all along South Sahyadri and between Palakkad Hills and Wayanad, in Apollonias arnottii, or 600 m. Macaronesian Apollonias barbujana.
Lauraceae are common in wet forest from sea level to the highest mountains, but are poorly represented in areas with a pronounced dry season. Apollonias need a ecosystem of great high humidity, type cloud forests. Apollonias is present about tropical or subtropical mountains, where the dense moisture from the sea or ocean, is precipitated by the action of the relief, causing it to condense part of the moisture that falls as rain or fog, creating an habitat especially cool, saturated with moisture in the air and soil. With no seasonal changes. apollonias need climate wetter, but with an annual oscillation of the temperature moderated by the proximity of the ocean. This type of habitat is found in laurel forest habitats like this of macaronesian laurisilva. Apollonias genus prefer humus rich soil in a sunny to partially shaded spot. They are fast growing foliage plants, that needs at least need 5°C in winter. Seed grow in any humus rich, slightly moist soil. Keep at constantly 12° to 20°C in partial shade in summer to full sun in winter. Higher temperatures will slow down or inhibit germination. Soil need to be ever wet.