Dr Paul Wilkin from Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and his colleagues from Thailand, the Netherlands and Poland have described a remarkable new species of dragon tree.
Dracaena kaweesakii and its flowers. Credit: Warakorn Kasempankul / Parinya Siriponamat / Paul Wilkin.
The species, called Dracaena kaweesakii, reaches an impressive 12 m in both height and crown diameter.
The specific name kaweesakii honors Thai biologist and co-author of the discovery, Kaweesak Keeratikiat.
Dracaena kaweesakii is a relative of the beautiful Canary Island dragon tree, Dracaena draco. It is an ecologically important species found only on limestone hills and mountains that are often associated with Buddhist temples in Thailand.
The tree is characterized by its extensive branching and has beautiful soft sword-shaped leaves with white edges and cream flowers with bright orange filaments, all highly distinctive features.
Dracaena kaweesakii is extracted from the wild for use in horticulture in Thailand and is one of the more popular species due to its extensive branching.
The new species in general are thought by Thai people to bring luck to households that have them, hence their popularity.
“A number of populations are protected by proximity to temples or having been transplanted into their gardens. There is no direct evidence yet of over-extraction but sustainability studies are needed at population level to insure the protection of this beautiful species.”
“Dracaena kaweesakii is thought to be endangered through having a limited distribution, destruction of limestone for concrete and extraction of trees for gardens,” said Dr Wilkin, who is a first author of the paper published in the open-access journal PhytoKeys.
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Bibliographic information: Wilkin P et al. 2013. A new species from Thailand and Burma, Dracaena kaweesakii Wilkin & Suksathan (Asparagaceae subfamily Nolinoideae). PhytoKeys 26: 101; doi: 10.3897/phytokeys.26.5335
