Hesperocyparis lusitanica, the Mexican cypress, cedar-of-Goa or Goa cedar, is a species of conifer in the cypress family, Cupressaceae, native to Mexico and Central America (Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras). It has also been introduced to Belize, Costa Rica and Nicaragua, growing at 1,200–3,000 metres (3,900–9,800 ft) altitude.
The scientific name lusitanica (of Portugal) refers to its very early cultivation there, with plants imported from Mexico to the monastery at Buçaco, near Coimbra in Portugal in about 1634; these trees were already over 130 years old when the species was botanically described by Miller in 1768.
In Mexico, the tree is also known as cedro blanco (white cedar) or teotlate.
Description
Hesperocyparis lusitanica is a coniferous tree with a conic to ovoid-conic crown, growing to 40 m tall. The foliage grows in dense sprays, dark green to somewhat yellow-green in colour. The leaves are scale-like, 2–5 mm long, and produced on rounded (not flattened) shoots. The seed cones are globose to oblong, 10–20 mm long, with four to 10 scales, green at first, maturing brown or grey-brown about 25 months after pollination.
The cones may either open at maturity to release the seeds, or remain closed for several years, only opening after the parent tree is killed in a wildfire, allowing the seeds to colonise the bare ground exposed by the fire. The male cones are 3–4 mm long, and release pollen in late winter to early spring (February–March in the northern hemisphere). In most of its natural environment the rainfall occurs with more quantity in summer.
Taxonomy
Hesperocyparis lusitanica was given its first scientific name by the botanist Philip Miller who named it Cupressus lusitanica in 1768, because he described it from collections made in Portugal. The species has a large number of synonyms and the species Hesperocyparis benthamii has been treated as variety or subspecies of H. lusitanica. In 2009 a paper was published moving...
