MORPHOLOGY OF KETELEERIA FORTUNEI 







CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE HULL BOTANICAL LABORATORY 225 



A. H. Hutchinson 



(WITH PLATES VII AND VIII AND THREE FIGURES) 



Since its discovery by Fortune, Keteleeria has aroused interest 

 as an endemic Chinese conifer. It was found first near the temple 

 of Foo Chow Foo, and reports of recent explorers locate it near 

 ancient shrines. Whether Keteleeria, as seems most probable in 

 the case of Ginkgo, was a sacred tree and has been preserved by a 

 religious order is a matter of conjecture. 



Because of limited knowledge, even of the gross structure and 

 characteristics, it is not surprising that the form now known as 

 Keteleeria has been variously placed by systematists. Lindley 

 named this form Abies jezoensis, mistaking it for a Japanese 

 species of that name (14). Murray, in 1862, showed that the 

 form in question differed from A bies jezoensis and called it A bies 

 Fortunei after the original discoverer. In 1868 Carriere made a 

 new genus Keteleeria, naming it after Keteleer, a Belgian horti- 

 culturist. Parlatore placed the same form under the genus 

 Finns, as P. Fortunei; by Bentham and Hooker it was classified 

 with Tsuga; Bentham and Masters again placed it in the genus 

 Abies; while by Engler it is described under Abies. 



Carriere's reasons for making a new genus were that the 

 form in question differs from Picea, since it has erect cones; it 

 cannot be included with Abies because the cone scales are persistent; 

 and at the same time, in habit and general aspect it resembles 

 Podocarpus. Further, Pirotta (14) states that a new genus is 

 justified because of the arrangement of the staminate strobili 

 ("fiori maschili ,? ). The bud of the staminate strobili is borne 

 either in the axils of the leaves of the preceding year or at the apex 

 of a branch. Pirotta regards the cone clusters as true " inflores- 

 cences." Each " inflorescence " consists of a short peduncle 

 dilated at the apex into a receptacle-like body which is invested 



Botanical Gazette, vol. 63] 



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