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Atago Forest and Green Protection Association

Atago Mountain Plants-Tree 4 (Sa-So)

This is a page of trees (flowers are displayed on a separate page for each season). Tree names are listed in order of Aiueo on this page. However, typical trees are displayed at the beginning of each page. Images of trees with flowers and fruits are also displayed on seasonal pages. Click on an image to see it in full view, or lay it down to enlarge it.
Cycad. Cycad family Cycas genus, endemic to Japan. It is mainly distributed in rocky areas along the coast of the Nansei Islands and southern Kyushu. The northern limit of my hometown is Cape Toi in Miyazaki Prefecture. It is widespread as a roadside tree and a garden tree. The leaves are pinnate compound leaves, and the tips are sharp and painful to the touch. Although it is a seed plant, the presence of sperm has been confirmed along with ginkgo.
Cycad is a feeding tree of Luthrodes panda, and the problem of feeding damage by larvae to sprouts. This butterfly is native to the tropics and subtropics of Asia, but has recently invaded Japan and moved northward, and was found in Chiba Prefecture in 2016. It was also confirmed at Atagoyama in the fall of 2020.
Fruit of cycad. The size is about 3-4 cm. Although cycad nuts and stems contain a large amount of starch, they are toxic and often die when eaten. However, it could be detoxified by sufficient treatment such as exposure to water, and it was a valuable food for famine.

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