Species profile—Bertya calycina
Classification
Plantae (plants) → Equisetopsida (land plants) → Euphorbiaceae → Bertya calycina
Sighting data
Species details
- Kingdom
- Plantae (plants)
- Class
- Equisetopsida (land plants)
- Family
- Euphorbiaceae
- Scientific name
- Bertya calycina Halford & R.J.F.Hend.
- WildNet taxon ID
- 26128
- Alternate name(s)
- Orkadilla bertya-shrub
- Nature Conservation Act 1992 (NCA) status
- Vulnerable
- Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC) status
- Vulnerable
- Conservation significant
- Yes
- Confidential
- No
- Endemicity
- Native
- Pest status
- Nil
- Short Notes
- Status annotated by author (Halford)
- Description
- Bertya calycina is a monoecious or dioecious, branched shrub growing up to 4 m tall that is viscid on most parts. The branchlets are angular, becoming terete with age, with a sparse to moderate indumentum of stellate hairs. The leaves are petiolate, spirally alternate and horizontally spread. The lamina is linear, 19-42 mm long and 1.2-3.1 mm wide. The adaxial lamina surface is green with sparse stellate hairs when young, becoming glabrous with age (some hair bases may remain making the leaf surface sparsely rough). The abaxial surface is white and densely covered by sessile stellate hairs. The lamina margin is recurved or sometimes revolute when dried, and the apex is acute or obtuse to rounded, usually apiculate. The inflorescences occur as a single flower or umbelliform with 2 flowers. The male flowers are sessile and covered with a sticky, thick syrupy secretion. They have five sepal lobes which are light green with a reddish blush to the ends, 2.7-3.2 mm long by 4.2-5.1 mm wide, with 56-59 stamens. The female flowers are pedicellate, with the pedicels 2.5-3.2 mm long, glabrous or with scattered stellate hairs. They have long, pale yellowish-red sepals with five lobes; the petals are absent or rudimentary and the ovary is covered in dense stellate hairs. The capsules are narrowly ellipsoid, 9.0-10.3 mm long by 5.0-6.1 mm wide, usually 1-seeded, covered in dense stellate hairs with persistent sepal lobes. The seeds are obloid, 6.5-7.5 mm long by 3.8-4 mm wide and 2.6-3.0 mm across, dark brown with a creamy-white caruncle (Halford and Henderson, 2002).
B. calycina is most closely related to B. glandulosa but differs by its white rather than pale rusty coloured hairy covering, its leaves with shorter leaf stalks and linear rather lorate, oblong or narrowly obovate laminas. B. calycina also resembles some forms of B. pedicellata but differs from those by its leaves with shorter stems, shorter and narrow leaves and its densely hary rather than hairless or sparsely covered ovary (Halford and Henderson 2002). - Map
- View Map
- Distribution
- Bertya calycina is confined to an area of sandstone outcrops at the south-western extremity in the Chesterton Range north-east Morven, in the south-west of Queensland (Orkadilla State Forest). It has a distributional range of approximately 12 km (Halford and Henderson, 2002; DSEWPC, 2012; Queensland Herbarium, 2012) .
- Distributional limits
- -26.0434391, 147.2261452
-26.1901059, 147.2683676 - Range derivation
- Range derived from extent of the taxon's verified records
- Habitat
- Bertya calycina grows in grows in ironbark-bloodwood woodland communities on shallow sand and sandy loamy soils along the lower slopes and gullies of a sandstone plateau (Halford and Henderson, 2002; DSEWPC, 2012; Queensland Herbarium, 2012) .
- Behaviour
- Wild fires in 1992 decreased Bertya calycina plant numbers at the site and there was no evidence of regeneration from seed in August of that year (Halford and Henderson 2002).
- Reproduction
- Flowering in Bertya calycina has been recorded in August, October and November. Fruits have been observed in August (Halford and Henderson 2002).
- Threatening processes
- The main potential threats to B. calycina include broad-scale vegetation clearing; changed fire regimes, and stochastic events causing localised extinction due to restricted distribution. The plants are resinous and this increases their susceptibility to elimination from wildfire (Halford and Henderson 2002; DSEWPC, 2012).
- Status notes
- Bertya calycina is listed as Vulnerable under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act and Vulnerable under the Queensland Nature Conservation Act 1992.
- Management recommendations
- Examples of regional and local priority actions for the recovery and threat abatement of Bertya calycina include: avoid habitat loss, disturbance and modification (e.g. monitor known populations for key threats, monitor the progress of recovery, minimise adverse impacts from land use); manage fire (e.g. develop and implement a suitable fire plan for the species, identify appropriate intensity and fire interval for the species); increase conservation information (e.g. raise awareness of B. calycina within the local community); and enable recovery of additional sites and/or populations (e.g. undertake appropriate seed collection and storage) (DSEWPC, 2012).
- References
- Bostock, P.D. and Holland, A.E. (eds) (2010). Census of the Queensland Flora 2010. Queensland Herbarium, Department of Environment and Resource Management, Brisbane.
Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities (DSEWPC) (2012). Bertya calycina in Species Profile and Threats Database, Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, Canberra. Accessed 17/01/2012. http://www.environment.gov.au/sprat.
Halford, D.A. and Henderson, R.J.F. (2002). Studies in Euphorbiaceae A.L.Juss. sens. lat. 3. A revision of Bertya Planch. (Ricinocarpeae Mull.Arg., Bertyinae Mull.Arg.). Austrobaileya 6 (2): 195-197.
Queensland Herbarium (2012). Specimen label information. Queensland Herbarium. Accessed 17/01/2012. - Profile author
- Lynise Wearne (17/01/2012)
Other resources
- Species Profile and Threats Database (SPRAT)
- The Australasian Virtual Herbarium (AVH)
- Atlas of Living Australia
Data source
This profile data is sourced from the QLD Wildlife Data API using the Get species by ID function used under CC-By 4.0.
https://apps.des.qld.gov.au/species/?op=getspeciesbyid&taxonid=26128.
This information is sourced from the WildNet database managed by the Queensland Department of Environment and Science.
