Buch.-Ham. ex D.Don
Description
Juniperus recurva, the drooping or Himalayan weeping juniper, is a high-mountain conifer native across the Himalaya and adjacent China, with a core distribution in China, Nepal, India, Bhutan, Myanmar, Afghanistan and Pakistan; its very large GBIF tally of around 1185 records includes numerous cultivated occurrences in Great Britain, the United States, Spain, New Zealand, Japan and Germany, reflecting its long history in horticulture. In the wild it is a tree of the subalpine and alpine zones, forming open woodland, krummholz and scattered stands at and above the timberline on dry, rocky slopes. The tree photographed at Gogona in Bhutan at about 3160 m in May typifies its occurrence in the upper subalpine belt, where it often mingles with Abies, Rhododendron and Betula.
It is an evergreen tree or large shrub with characteristically pendulous, drooping branchlets and reddish-brown, fibrous bark that peels in long strips. The foliage consists of needle-like (acicular) juvenile-type leaves borne in whorls of three, incurved and sharply pointed, with a glaucous adaxial band; the leaves are retained as adults rather than reduced to scales. The species is typically dioecious, with small terminal pollen cones and ovulate cones that mature over two seasons into fleshy, berry-like galbuli that ripen blue-black to brownish and usually contain a single seed.
Juniperus recurva belongs to section Juniperus (the needle-leaved junipers) and includes the well-known coffin-juniper variant (var. coxii) with especially long pendulous shoots. Its fleshy cones are dispersed by birds and mammals, and the aromatic foliage is traditionally burned as incense across the Buddhist Himalaya. Although globally widespread and not classed as threatened, local populations near settlements are depleted by cutting for incense and fuel, and as a slow-growing timberline species it is potentially sensitive to warming-driven shifts in the upper forest limit.
Author: Buch.-Ham. ex D.Don · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 4, Flora of Bhutan Vol. 1, Flora of Nepal, Adams Junipers of the World: The Genus Juniperus