Podocarpus bidwillii, Hooibr. ex Endlicher, 1847

Molloy, B. P. J., 2015, The correct name for the New Zealand endemic conifer Hall’s totara (Araucariales: Podocarpaceae), Phytotaxa 220 (2), pp. 101-116 : 103

Podocarpus bidwillii

As described by Endlicher, Podocarpus bidwillii (as Bidwilli) translates to read: ‘Eupodocarp with leaves spreading everywhere, linear-lanceolate (1 inch: 1½ lines), on both sides narrowed, mucronate, without nerves, and with acute leaf-bud scales ’ [italics mine] ( Endlicher 1847: 213). Podocarpus bidwillii was listed, and presumably accepted, in early European and American catalogues, synopses and conifer manuals, eg., Lindley & Gordon (1851), Dietrich (1852), Carrière (1855), Gordon (1858), Henkel & Hochstetter (1865), and Hoopes (1868).

Italian botanist and conifer specialist Filippo Parlatore (1868: 514) cited P. bidwillii as a synonym of the New Zealand forest tree Podocarpus totara , and his treatment was followed by the New Zealand flora writer Cheeseman (1925: 111), and the American botanist Netta Gray (1956: 163). Later, Gray (1958: 443), in a revision of South Pacific species of Podocarpus , cited P. bidwillii as a synonym of P. spinulosus . This relationship was established much earlier by the French botanist and conifer specialist Élie-Abel Carrière (1867: 654) who made the following observations:

‘I have been able to assure myself after an examination of specimens and live individuals that Podocarpus spinulosa R.Br., and Bidwilli, Hoibr. , are identical...... I even add that P.laeta, Bidwilli , pungens, spinulosa , Alpina and Lawrencii, are most probably only forms of P.Totara .’

There is a specimen of a cultivated plant of P. spinulosus (as ‘spinulosa’) in the Natural History Museum Paris (P01633546!) from the ‘Herbier De L’ Abbé Lelièvé’ bearing its characteristic leaves with a mid-dorsal ridge, resting buds with acute leaf-bud scales, and labelled as such by Carrière (Carr. 453) on 3 July 56 [1856]. It is now generally accepted that Endlicher’s P. bidwillii is synonymous with P. spinulosus , a conifer of shrub-like proportions with acute leaf-bud scales with fine free tips, confined to heathland over poor soils and coastal sand deposits, and endemic to eastern Australia ( Hill 1998: 53).

Attempts to locate duplicate specimens of Endlicher’s P. bidwillii have so far been unsuccessful. However, in the Berlin Herbarium, there is a specimen of a cultivated plant acquired in 1913 from the ‘Herbarium Dendrologicum’ of the dendrologist Karl Koch, and labelled in his hand ‘ Podocarpus Bidwilli’.

Underneath, in an unknown hand, are the words ‘ist sicher falsch’ [is certainly wrong]. Below this on the same label, also in an unknown hand, is written ‘= Podocarpus laeta’. The digital image of this specimen (B10 0426223, Fig.1 ), on close examination, supports its placement under P. laetus as described by Endlicher, in particular its terminal resting buds with obtuse leaf-bud scales, and leaves with a mid-dorsal groove or furrow.

Figures

FIGURE 1. Podocarpus laetus (as Bidwilli), B10 0426223, Copyright © Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin-Dahlem, Freie Universität Berlin; reproduced with permission.