Ficus microcarpa
| Ficus microcarpa | |
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| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| (unranked): | Angiosperms |
| (unranked): | Eudicots |
| (unranked): | Rosids |
| Order: | Rosales |
| Family: | Moraceae |
| Genus: | Ficus |
| Species: | F. microcarpa |
| Binomial name | |
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Ficus microcarpa L.f. 1782 not Vahl 1805 |
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| Synonyms | |
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Ficus microcarpa, also known as Chinese banyan, Malayan banyan, Taiwan banyan, Indian laurel, curtain fig, or gajumaru (ガジュマル?), is a tree native in the range from China through Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim, India, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, the Malay Archipelago, New Guinea, Australia, the Ryukyu Islands, and New Caledonia. It is widely planted as a shade tree and frequently misidentified as F. retusa or as F. nitida (F. benjamina).
Ficus microcarpa has been described in 1782 by Carl Linnaeus the Younger. The species has a considerable number of synonyms. In 1965, E. J. H. Corner described seven varieties (and two forms of Ficus microcarpa var. microcarpa) which were regarded as synonyms under the name of Ficus microcarpa in the latestFlora Malesiana volume.
Hill's weeping fig was first formally described as a species, Ficus hillii, by Frederick Manson Bailey in the Botany Bulletin of the Queensland Department of Agriculture, based on the type specimen collected in the "scrubs of tropical Queensland'". In 1965, it was reassigned by E. J .H. Corner as a variety of F. microcarpa, namely F. microcarpa var. hillii.
Ficus microcarpa was widely distributed as an ornamental plant and is one of the most common street trees in warm climates. The symbiotic pollinating fig wasp, Eupristina verticillata, was introduced along with F. microcarpa. Such an introduction, however, can be delayed: in Brazil - where specimens of the tree had been used in gardening since the nineteenth century, when it was introduced by the architect Auguste François Marie Glaziou into various public parks of Rio de Janeiro - the appearance of saplings began only during the 1970s. Such saplings are considered to be very aggressive, as they can grow in the walls of buildings, bridges, highways, and other concrete structures. The tree is considered a major invasive species in Hawaii, Florida, Bermuda, Central America, and South America. It's commonly used as a ornamental tree in most of Spain's mediterranean coast, as in the Balearic and the Canary islands. Ficus microcarpa can also be found on the Algarve, the southern coast of Sicily or in Cyprus. It is a common ornamental tree in the Tel Aviv, Israel area.
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Wikipedia