Torreya nucifera is a slow-growing, coniferous

Pinophyta

The conifers, division Pinophyta, also known as division Coniferophyta or Coniferae, are one of 13 or 14 division level taxa within the Kingdom Plantae. Pinophytes are gymnosperms. They are cone-bearing seed plants with vascular tissue; all extant conifers are woody plants, the great majority being...

 tree

Tree

A tree is a perennial woody plant. It is most often defined as a woody plant that has many secondary branches supported clear of the ground on a single main stem or trunk with clear apical dominance. A minimum height specification at maturity is cited by some authors, varying from 3 m to...

 native to southern Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

 and to South Korea

South Korea

The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...

's Jeju Island. It is also called or Japanese nutmeg-yew.

Description

It grows to 15-25 m tall with a trunk up to 1.5 m diameter. The leaves

Leaf

A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant, as defined in botanical terms, and in particular in plant morphology. Foliage is a mass noun that refers to leaves as a feature of plants....

 are evergreen

Evergreen

In botany, an evergreen plant is a plant that has leaves in all seasons. This contrasts with deciduous plants, which completely lose their foliage during the winter or dry season.There are many different kinds of evergreen plants, both trees and shrubs...

, needle-like, 2-3 cm long and 3 mm broad, with a sharply spined tip and two whitish stomatal bands on the underside; they are spirally arranged, but twisted at the base to lie horizontally either side of the stem. It is subdioecious

Plant sexuality

Plant sexuality covers the wide variety of sexual reproduction systems found across the plant kingdom. This article describes morphological aspects of sexual reproduction of plants....

, with individual trees producing either mostly male or mostly female cones

Conifer cone

A cone is an organ on plants in the division Pinophyta that contains the reproductive structures. The familiar woody cone is the female cone, which produces seeds. The male cones, which produce pollen, are usually herbaceous and much less conspicuous even at full maturity...

, but usually with at least some cones of the other sex present. The male cones are globular, 5-6 mm diameter, in a double row along the underside of a shoot. The female cones are borne in clusters of three to eight together, maturing in 18–20 months to a single seed

Seed

A seed is a small embryonic plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some stored food. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant...

 surrounded by a fleshy layer, 2 cm long and 1.5 cm broad.

Uses

Its wood is prized for the construction of Go boards because of its beautiful yellow-gold color, fine and uniform ring texture, and the sonic quality of the click of a stone on its surface. The tree is protected in Japan because of its scarcity due to past overcutting. Ancient kaya trees have to die before they can be harvested to make thick Go boards, which makes them extremely expensive; the finest ones can cost over $19,000. Shin-kaya (new kaya in Japanese), imitation kaya, is usually Alaska

Alaska

Alaska is the largest state in the United States by area. It is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait...

n, Tibet

Tibet

Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...

an or Siberia

Siberia

Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...

n white spruce

White Spruce

Picea glauca is a species of spruce native to boreal forests in the north of North America, from central Alaska east to Newfoundland, and south to northern Montana, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, upstate New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine; there is also an isolated population in the...

, which has become somewhat popular for cheaper equipment due to the scarcity of kaya trees. Go bowls can also be made of kaya.

The seeds are edible, and also pressed for their vegetable oil content.

External links

• Arboretum de Villardebelle - Torreya nucifera