Melicope simplex

Abstract: Wood anatomy of Melicope ternata, M. simplex, and Phebalium nudum is described. In M. simplex and M. ternata vessels have no helical thickenings, most perforation plates are simple but some are scalariform or reticulate, grooves connect pit apertures, and vessel to ray pits are sometimes unilaterally compound. Disjunctive ray and axial parenchyma cells are present. Melicope simplex is distinguished from M. ternata in having narrower rays, more disjunctive ray cells, and narrower boundary bands of axial parenchyma. The vessel elements of P. nudum have helical thickenings and simple perforation plates, and lack unilaterally compound pits. Disjunctive axial parenchyma cells are absent and disjunctive ray cells are rare. Boundary axial parenchyma and rays are usually only 1-2 cells wide. Vasicentric tracheids are common in P. nudum but rare in M. simplex and M. ternata. Silica bodies occur in the parenchyma cells of all three species.

Abstract: Germination rates, percentage germination success, and phenomena related to germination delay were determined for seeds from freshly collected fruit of Melicope simplex, Myoporum laetum, Myrsine divaricata, and Urtica ferox. The disseminule of Myoporum is unusual in having up to four seeds enclosed in fused endocarp tissue. The tests were carried out in an unheated, partially shaded glasshouse in Christchurch, in a range of conditions similar to those that the seeds might experience after natural dispersal. In the standard treatment (cleaned, kept moist, well lit) subsets of seeds in a cohort germinated at intervals over three, four, or five years, according to species. It took about one month (Urtica), two months (Myrsine), five months (Myoporum), or seven months (Melicope) for the first seeds to germinate. Some seeds of each species germinated through the winter and/or spring in the first year. Otherwise, there were episodes of germination, with different proportionate numbers germinating for e...