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Encephalartos woodii, Wood's cycad, is a rare cycad in the genus Encephalartos, and is endemic to the oNgoye Forest of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. It is one of the rarest plants in the world, being extinct in the wild with all specimens being clones of the type . [ 2 ]
Cycads in South Africa. Cycads / ˈ s aɪ k æ d z / are seed plants that typically have a stout and woody trunk with a crown of large, hard, stiff, evergreen and (usually) pinnate leaves. The species are dioecious, that is, individual plants of a species are either male or female. Cycads vary in size from having trunks only a few centimeters ...
While there are more than 200 species of cycads, only one is native to Florida, and only a couple are popular landscaping plants in our area.
Like other cycads, Z. integrifolia is dioecious, having male or female plants. The male cones are cylindrical, growing to 5–16 cm long; they are often clustered. The female cones are elongate-ovoid and grow to 5–19 cm long and 4–6 cm in diameter. [8] It produces reddish seed cones with a distinct acuminate tip.
The seeds when mature measure about 5 cm (2.0 in) long by 4 cm (1.6 in) wide and are sheathed in a bright red sarcotesta. [ 4 ] [ 5 ] [ 6 ] It is reputed to be the tallest known species of cycad and it towers over other understorey vegetation, but rarely reaches the forest canopy .
Cardboard cycads can only be reproduced by the fleshy, brightly crimson-colored seeds produced by the female plants. The germination process is very slow and difficult to achieve in cultivation; as a result, many plants sold for horticultural use are illegally collected in the wild, leading to the species being classified as Endangered.
The cylindrical cones are some of the largest of all cycad cones, rivalled only by Encephalartos transvenosus. [4] The male cones can reach seventy five centimetres long and the female cones ninety centimetres, weighing up to forty five kilograms. [4] The seeds are large and numerous and have red sarcotesta. [2]
Encephalartos horridus, the Eastern Cape blue cycad, [3] is a small, low-growing cycad up to 0.9 m (3.0 ft) high and 0.9 m (3.0 ft) wide. [4] It is a native of Eastern Cape Province, South Africa, and found in arid shrublands, most commonly on ridges and slopes with shallow soils.