柽柳属属

物种

• 本属包括以下物种：
• 白花柽柳 Tamarix androssowii
• 无叶柽柳 Tamarix aphylla
• 密花柽柳 Tamarix arceuthoides
• 甘蒙柽柳 Tamarix austromongolica
• 柽柳 Tamarix chinensis
• 长穗柽柳 Tamarix elongata
• Tamarix gallica (Hablitz)
• 甘肃柽柳 Tamarix gansuensis
• 翠枝柽柳 Tamarix gracilis
• 刚毛柽柳 Tamarix hispida
• 多花柽柳 Tamarix hohenackeri

Tamarix humboldtiana Akhani, Borsch & N. Samadi

• 金塔柽柳 Tamarix jintaensis
• 盐地柽柳 Tamarix karelinii
• 短穗柽柳 Tamarix laxa
• 细穗柽柳 Tamarix leptostachya
• 蒙古柽柳 Tamarix mongolica
• Tamarix parviflora
• 多枝柽柳 Tamarix ramosissima
• 莎车柽柳 Tamarix sachensis
• 沙生柽柳 Tamarix taklamakanensis
• 塔里木柽柳 Tamarix tarimensis
• 纤细柽柳 Tamarix tenuissima

The genus Tamarix (tamarisk, salt cedar, taray) is composed of about 50–60 species of flowering plants in the family Tamaricaceae, native to drier areas of Eurasia and Africa. The generic name originated in Latin and may refer to the Tamaris River in Hispania Tarraconensis (Spain).

Description

They are evergreen or deciduous shrubs or trees growing to 1–18 m (3+1⁄2–59 ft) in height and forming dense thickets. The largest, Tamarix aphylla, is an evergreen tree that can grow to 18 m (59 ft) tall. They usually grow on saline soils, tolerating up to 15,000 ppm soluble salt, and can also tolerate alkaline conditions.

Tamarisks are characterized by slender branches and grey-green foliage. The bark of young branches is smooth and reddish brown. As the plants age, the bark becomes gray-brown, ridged and furrowed.

The leaves are scale-like, almost like that of junipers, 1–2 mm (1⁄20–1⁄10 in) long, and overlap each other along the stem. They are often encrusted with salt secretions.

The pink to white flowers appear in dense masses on 5–10 cm (2.0–3.9 in) long spikes at branch tips from March to September, though some species (e.g., T. aphylla) tend to flower in the summer until as late as November.

Selected species

Formerly placed here

Myricaria germanica (L.) Desv. (as T. germanica L.)

Ecology

Tamarix aphylla can spread both vegetatively, by submerged stems producing adventitious roots, and sexually, by seeds. Each flower can produce thousands of tiny (1 mm; 1/20" diameter) seeds that are contained in a small capsule usually adorned with a tuft of hair that aids in wind dispersal. Seeds can also be dispersed by water. Seedlings require extended periods of soil saturation for establishment. Tamarisk trees are most often propagated by cuttings.

These trees grow in disturbed and undisturbed streams, waterways, bottom lands, banks, and drainage washes of natural or artificial water bodies, moist rangelands and pastures.

Whether Tamarix species are fire-adapted or not is unclear, but in many cases a large proportion of the trees are able to resprout from the stump after fires, although not notably more so than other riverine species. They likely cannot resprout from root suckers. In some habitats where they are native, wildfire appears to favour the establishment of riverine trees such as Populus, to the detriment of Tamarix.

Uses

Tamarisk species, notably T. ramosissima and T. tetrandra, are used as ornamental shrubs, windbreaks, and shade trees.

In the Southwest United States, tamarisk was introduced to help erosion control.

On the steppes of Central Asia, the Saka may have used tamarisk wood (combined with horn) to produce tremendously powerful bows hundreds of years before the common era.

The wood may be used for carpentry or firewood; it is a possible agroforestry species.

At certain times of year, scale insects feeding upon the tender twigs of tamarisk plants excrete a sweet substance known as honeydew, which has been gathered for use as a food source and sweetener for thousands of years. The substance is also known locally as manna, and some scholars have suggested that this substance is the biblical manna that fed the Israelites during their flight from Egypt, though others dispute this interpretation.

Tamarisks play a role in anti-desertification programs in China.

In North America

The tamarisk was introduced to the United States as an ornamental shrub, a windbreak, and a shade tree in the early 19th century.

In culture

A disputation poem dating to the 18th century BC, Tamarisk and Palm, features a personified tamarisk debating the date-palm over who is better.

In Genesis 21:33, Abraham is recorded to have "planted a tamarisk at Beer-sheba". He had built a well there, earlier.

In 1 Samuel 22:6, Saul is sitting under a tamarisk tree on a hill at Gibeah when he learns that David has returned to Judah.

In 1 Samuel 31:13, Saul's bones are buried under a tamarisk tree in Jabesh.

In the Quran 34:16, the people of Saba were punished when "[Allah] converted their two garden (rows) into gardens producing bitter fruit and tamarisks...".

Wedgwood made a "Tamarisk" china pattern.

In the Iliad 10:465 Odysseus buries the spoils from a captured Trojan spy under a tamarisk tree, and marks their spot with reeds and tamarisk shoots. The spoils (a polecat cap, wolfskin cloak, long spear and bow) are dedicated to the goddess Athena.

Gerald Murnane's prose fiction Tamarisk Row refers to a racehorse, and to an estate, of that name