Plantae > Tracheophyta > Magnoliopsida > Fabales > Fabaceae > Castanospermum > Castanospermum australe

Castanospermum australe (Moreton Bay Chestnut; Black Bean; Chataignier d'Australie; Chataigne de la Nouv. Hollande; Australian Chestnut)

Synonyms: Castanocarpus australis (homotypic); Castanospermum australe var. brevivexillum; Castanospermum brevivexillum; Castanospermum cunninghamii; Vieillardia grandiflora

Wikipedia Abstract

Castanospermum australe (Moreton Bay Chestnut or Blackbean), the only species in the genus Castanospermum, is a flowering plant in the family Fabaceae, native to the east coast of Australia in Queensland and New South Wales, and to the Pacific islands of Vanuatu, New Caledonia, and the island of New Britain (Papua New Guinea). Members of this genus accumulate iminosugars in their leaves.
View Wikipedia Record: Castanospermum australe

Attributes

Allergen Potential [1]  Medium-Low
Edible [2]  May be edible. See the Plants For A Future link below for details.
Flower Type [2]  Hermaphrodite
Hazards [2]  The immature seed is poisonous, though mature seeds are harmless; Another report says that the raw seed is poisonous and needs treatment to render it edible;
Janka Hardness [3]  1690 lbf (767 kgf) Medium
Leaf Type [2]  Evergreen
Pollinators [2]  Birds
Scent [2]  The crushed leaves smell like cucumbers.
Specific Gravity [4]  0.625
Structure [2]  Tree
Usage [2]  The seeds have a high saponin content; Although the report does not elaborate, the saponins could probably be used as a soap substitute; Wood - durable, resists decay, hard, heavy, polishes well, has a high resistance to the passage of electric current. Used in construction, cabinet making, carving etc;
Height [2]  59 feet (18 m)
Width [2]  26 feet (8 m)
View Plants For A Future Record : Castanospermum australe

Protected Areas

Name IUCN Category Area acres Location Species Website Climate Land Use
Norfolk Island National Park II 1723 Australian external territories, Australia  

Predators

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Derived from Allergy-Free Gardening OPALS™, Thomas Leo Ogren (2000)
♦ 2Plants For A Future licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
♦ 3Wood Janka Hardness Scale/Chart J W Morlan's Unique Wood Gifts
♦ 4Chave J, Coomes D, Jansen S, Lewis SL, Swenson NG, Zanne AE (2009) Towards a worldwide wood economics spectrum. Ecology Letters 12: 351-366. Zanne AE, Lopez-Gonzalez G, Coomes DA, Ilic J, Jansen S, Lewis SL, Miller RB, Swenson NG, Wiemann MC, Chave J (2009) Data from: Towards a worldwide wood economics spectrum. Dryad Digital Repository.
♦ 5Species Interactions of Australia Database, Atlas of Living Australia, Version ala-csv-2012-11-19
♦ 6Biological Records Centre Database of Insects and their Food Plants
♦ 7Ben-Dov, Y., Miller, D.R. & Gibson, G.A.P. ScaleNet 4 November 2009
♦ 8del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.
♦ 9The Spectacled Flying-Fox, Pteropus conspicillatus (Chiroptera: Pteropodidae), in North Queensland 2. Diet, seed dispersal and feeding ecology, G. C. Richards, Australian Mammalogy, Vol 13 Nos. 1 & 2, pp. 25-31
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0