Atalaya (plant)

Atalaya is a genus of eighteen species of trees and shrubs of the plant family Sapindaceae. As of 2013 fourteen species grow naturally in Australia and in neighbouring New Guinea only one endemic species is known to science. Three species are known growing naturally in southern Africa, including two species endemic to South Africa and one species in South Africa, Swaziland and Mozambique.[1][2][3][4][5][6]

Atalaya
Atalaya salicifolia (type species) habit (above), foliage (below)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Rosids
Order: Sapindales
Family: Sapindaceae
Subfamily: Sapindoideae
Genus: Atalaya
Blume[1]
Type species
Atalaya salicifolia
(A.DC.) Blume[1]
Species

See text

Atalaya calcicola foliage
Atalaya hemiglauca foliage and flowers, Rockhampton, Queensland

One species A. salicifolia, which grows in Australia, has a wider distribution through nearby Timor and westwards through some more of the Lesser Sunda Islands (Indonesia).[2] This species has the widest distribution of all and is the type species—the first to have a formal scientific name, description and represent the genus.[7]

In biodiversity–rich New Guinea as of 2013, many areas do not have complete formal scientific botanical survey. In this context, science seems to have only recorded the knowledge of A. papuana growing there naturally as the putative sole endemic species. Regionally widespread A. salicifolia does not seem to have scientific records from New Guinea even though science has recorded it many times in the regions of northern Australia and Timor nearest to southern and western New Guinea.[4][7]

Biogeography, habitats and conservation

In mainland Australia's warmer places, twelve species are known by published formal botanical descriptions—trees, shrubs and subshrubs, growing naturally in rainforests, brigalow scrubs, monsoon forests (rainforests in a climate of a summer wet season and cool dry season, with drought–deciduous trees), tropical savannas, coastal scrubs, some arid desert areas and in similar vegetation associations further south than the tropics.[6] Certain species particularly occur in Australia's restricted areas of naturally high nutrient soil types, for instances, soils built from limestone or basalt parent materials. Areas of more fertile soils than average Australian soils, have not surprisingly had their native vegetation associations preferentially destroyed for converting the soils to European–Australian agricultural methods. This has disproportionately brought about the decline of the specialised native plants of these soils.[6]

Two Australian species found in Queensland have herbarium specimen collections and published informal descriptions, but are awaiting formal publication of scientific descriptions and names. Collectively, the fourteen known Australian species range throughout warmer parts of the continent, including parts of the semi-arid and arid zones, in Queensland, the Northern Territory, Western Australia, New South Wales and South Australia, except for Tasmania and Victoria where they have not been recorded.[6] Some Australian species have very reduced, scarce or isolated known ranges and natural habitats, as of 2013. Atalaya collina Yarwun Whitewood trees, have a known range of only two very isolated populations to the west of Gladstone, Queensland, hence this species' populations have a national conservation status listing of "endangered" in the Australian government Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC).[8]

Ian D. Cowie, Glenn M. Wightman and Benjamin Stuckey formally scientifically named and described the restricted endemic, unique, Atalaya brevialata subshrub species, in their recently published, Dec 2012, scientific paper.[2][3] Botanists have found this species growing naturally only in a restricted area of the Darwin region of Australia. In their formal scientific description Cowie, Wightman and Stuckey have published the species global conservation status (IUCN) of "endangered" under the following criteria "IUCN B1, 2ab (i, ii, iii, iv, v)".[2] A. brevialata plants have the unusual and unique nature among Atalaya species of a suffruticose growing habit; meaning, in this case, a species which has evolved from an ancestral group of woody–trunked shrubs or trees into having woody growth only underground and above ground only leafy growth. They grow naturally only up to 45 cm (18 in) tall subshrubs, with the leafy above ground growth that dies back each dry season to the underground woody rootstocks.[2]

In South Africa three species grow naturally. The scarcity of A. natalensis trees and their restricted range has received the global conservation status (IUCN) of "vulnerable D2".[9] A. capensis has a global conservation status (IUCN) listing also, of "Lower Risk / conservation dependent" as of December 2013.[10]

In Papua New Guinea A. papuana grows naturally in coast monsoon dune scrub (coastal rainforests on dune soils that become seasonally dry, with deciduous trees), tropical savanna forests and in regenerating areas of regularly burning swamp forests and rainforests.

Naming and classification

European science formally named and described the genus Atalaya in 1847, authored by Carl L. Blume, with the Timor type specimen of the species Atalaya salicifolia.[1]

Two species were formally described in 1965 by Pieter W. Leenhouts in preparations for treatment of the family Sapindaceae in Flora Malesiana.[11] In 1981, 1985 and 1991, Sally T. Reynolds scientifically described several new Australian species in two scientific journal articles and in her writing of the Atalaya section of the Flora of Australia (series).[6][12][13]

Species

Australian species information was sourced from the authoritative Australian Plant Name Index and Australian Plant Census,[3] the Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants information system,[14] Fruits of the Australian Tropical Rainforest,[5] scientific journal papers,[12][13] the Flora of New South Wales,[15] and the Flora of Australia.[6] Regarding taxa in New Guinea, Malesia and Africa only few information sources were found, such as the Census of Vascular Plants of Papua New Guinea,[4] Flora Malesiana,[7] and the South African National Biodiversity Institute web sites and the IUCN, respectively, thus for these lands this list may be incomplete.

Species provisionally named, described and accepted according to the authoritative Australian Plant Name Index as of June 2014 while awaiting formal publication
  • Atalaya sp. Chillagoe (L.J.Webb+ 13226) Qld Herbarium (2006) – Queensland, Australia[3]
  • Atalaya sp. Scawfell Island (G.N.Batianoff+ 6098) Qld Herbarium (2006) – Queensland, Australia[3]
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References
  1. Blume, Carl L. von (1847). "Atalaya; Atalaya salicifolia". XXVIII. De Quibusdam Sapindaceis Maxima Parte Indiæ Orientali Propriis [28. On some Sapindaceae of the greater part of India and the East] (Digitised archive copy, online, from biodiversitylibrary.org). Rumphia. 3. pp. 186–87. Retrieved 26 November 2013.
  2. Cowie, I. D.; Stuckey, B. (2012). "Atalaya brevialata (Sapindaceae) a new species from the Northern Territory, Australia" (PDF). Nuytsia. 22 (6). pp. 364–369, Figs 1–3.
  3. "Atalaya%". Australian Plant Name Index (APNI), Integrated Botanical Information System (IBIS) database (listing by % wildcard matching of all taxa relevant to Australia). Centre for Plant Biodiversity Research, Australian Government. Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  4. Conn, Barry J. (2008). "Atalaya". Census of Vascular Plants of Papua New Guinea. (search result listing, matching all starting with "Atalaya", via www.pngplants.org). Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  5. Cooper, Wendy; Cooper, William T. (June 2004). "Atalaya Blume". Fruits of the Australian Tropical Rainforest. Clifton Hill, Victoria, Australia: Nokomis Editions. pp. 478–480. ISBN 9780958174213. Archived from the original on 9 April 2013. Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  6. Reynolds (1985), pp. 12–18.
  7. Leenhouts (1994), pp. 479–83.
  8. Atalaya collina – Yarwun Whitewood, Species Profile and Threats Database, Department of the Environment and Heritage, Australia.
  9. Hilton-Taylor, C.; Scott-Shaw, R. & Abbott, T. (1998). "Atalaya natalensis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 1998: e.T34936A9899222. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.1998.RLTS.T34936A9899222.en.
  10. Hilton-Taylor, C. & Dold, T. (1998). "Atalaya capensis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 1998: e.T30341A9538526. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.1998.RLTS.T30341A9538526.en.
  11. Leenhouts, P. W. (1965). "Florae Malesianae Precursores. XLI. Notes on Sapindaceae I. Atalaya". Blumea. 13 (1): 126.
  12. Reynolds, S. T. (1981). "Notes on Sapindaceae in Australia, I". Austrobaileya. 1 (4): 388–419. JSTOR 41738625.
  13. Reynolds, S. T. (1991). "New species and changes in Sapindaceae from Queensland". Austrobaileya. 3 (3): 489–501. JSTOR 41738788.
  14. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Sapindaceae". Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  15. Harden, Gwen J. (December 2003). "Atalaya – New South Wales Flora Online". PlantNET – The Plant Information Network System. 2.0. Sydney, Australia: The Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust. Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  16. Mbambezeli, Giles (October 2008). "Atalaya alata" (Online information website). PlantZAfrica.com: The site for information about plants native to southern Africa. Kirstenbosch NBG. Pretoria, South Africa: South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  17. Victor, J. E.; van Wyk, A. E. (2005). "Atalaya alata (Sim) H.M.L.Forbes". Red List of South African Plants: National Assessment. 2013.1. Threatened Species Programme. South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  18. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Atalaya angustifolia". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  19. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya angustifolia". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  20. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Atalaya australiana". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  21. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya australiana". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  22. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya calcicola". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  23. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Atalaya calcicola". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  24. Victor, J. E.; Dold, A. P. (2006). "Atalaya capensis R.A.Dyer". Red List of South African Plants: National Assessment. 2013.1. Threatened Species Programme. South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  25. Reynolds (online, updated) [1985] Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya collina". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  26. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya hemiglauca". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  27. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya multiflora". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  28. Scott-Shaw, C. R.; van Wyk, A. E.; von Staden, L.; Victor, J. E. (2006). "Atalaya natalensis R.A.Dyer". Red List of South African Plants: National Assessment. 2013.1. Threatened Species Programme. South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  29. Reynolds (online, updated) [1985] Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya oligoclada". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  30. Leenhouts (1994) Flora Malesiana. Digitised, online "Atalaya papuana". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  31. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya rigida". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  32. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya salicifolia". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  33. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Atalaya salicifolia". Archived from the original on 16 March 2012. Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  34. Leenhouts (1994) Flora Malesiana. Digitised, online "Atalaya salicifolia". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  35. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Atalaya sericopetala". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  36. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya sericopetala". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  37. Reynolds (1985) Flora of Australia. Online "Atalaya variifolia". Retrieved 26 April 2013.
  38. Hyland et al. (2010) [RFK 6.1] "Factsheet – Atalaya variifolia". Retrieved 26 April 2013.

Cited works
  • Hyland, B. P. M.; Whiffin, T.; Zich, F. A.; et al. (December 2010). "Home". Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants (6.1, online version RFK 6.1 ed.). Cairns, Australia: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), through its Division of Plant Industry; the Centre for Australian National Biodiversity Research; the Australian Tropical Herbarium, James Cook University. Retrieved 22 December 2013.
  • Leenhouts, P. W. (1994). "Atalaya" (Digitised, online). In Adema, F.; Leenhouts, P. W.; van Welzen, P. C. (eds.). Flora Malesiana. Series I, Spermatophyta : Flowering Plants. Vol. 11 pt. 3: Sapindaceae. Leiden, The Netherlands: Rijksherbarium / Hortus Botanicus, Leiden University. pp. 479–483. ISBN 90-71236-21-8.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Reynolds, S. T. (1985). "Atalaya" (online version). Flora of Australia: Volume 25. Flora of Australia series. CSIRO Publishing / Australian Biological Resources Study. pp. 12–18. ISBN 978-0-644-03724-2. Retrieved 22 December 2013.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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