About Canella winterana (L.) Gaertn.
Canella winterana (L.) Gaertn. is a tree with scaly aromatic bark and stout ash-gray branchlets that are distinctly marked by large circular leaf scars. Its flowers are perfect and regular, arranged in many-flowered subcorymbose terminal or subterminal panicles made up of several dichotomously branched cymes growing from the axis of upper leaves or small caducous bracts. Leaves are petiolate, alternate, lack stipules, are penniveined, entire, pellucid-punctate, and coriaceous; they are obovate, rounded or slightly emarginate at the apex, narrow into a short stout grooved petiole, measure 3.5 to 5.0 inches long and 1.5 to 2.0 inches broad, and are bright deep green and lustrous.
For floral structures: there are 3 imbricated persistent sepals, which are suborbiculate, concave, coriaceous, erect, and have ciliate margins. There are 5 imbricate petals, which are hypogynous, arranged in a single row on a slightly convex receptacle, oblong, concave, rounded at the tip, fleshy, twice as long as the sepals, and white or rose-colored. Stamens are monadelphous: around twenty hypogynous stamens have filaments fused into a tube that is crenulate at the summit, extending slightly above the linear anthers. Anthers are attached to the outer face of the tube and open longitudinally via two valves. The ovary is free, enclosed within the androecium, cylindrical or oblong-conical, one-celled, with two parietal placentas and few ovules. It has a short fleshy style, with a two or three-lobed stigmatic summit; ovules are arcuate, horizontal or descending, imperfectly anatropous, and attached by a short funiculus.
The fruit is baccate (berry-like), indehiscent, contains 2 to 4 seeds, and is globular or slightly ovate, fleshy, tipped with a small point formed by the base of the persistent style. When ripe in March and April, the fruit is bright crimson, soft, and fleshy, and is eaten by many birds. Seeds are reniform (kidney-shaped) and suspended; the seed coat is thick, crustaceous, and shiny black, with a soft membranaceous tegmen. The embryo is curved, located near the top of the copious oleo-fleshy endosperm, with its radicle positioned next to the hilum, and has oblong cotyledons.
The wood of Canella winterana is very heavy, extremely hard, strong, and close-grained, with numerous thin inconspicuous medullary rays. It is dark red-brown, while the thick sapwood, which makes up 25 to 30 annual growth layers, is light brown or yellow. The specific gravity of absolutely dry wood from Florida-grown individuals is 0.9893, and a cubic foot of dry wood weighs 61.65 pounds. In Florida, the tree reaches a height of 25 to 30 feet, with a straight trunk 8 to 10 inches in diameter; it is reported to sometimes grow up to 50 feet tall on the mountains of Jamaica. Its main branches are slender, horizontal, and spreading, forming a compact round crown. The light gray trunk bark is one-eighth of an inch thick, with a surface broken into many short thick scales rarely longer than 2-3 inches, and is about twice as thick as the pale yellow aromatic inner bark. Flowers open in autumn.
Canella winterana is widely distributed: it is native to the Bahamas, Cayman Islands, Cuba, Hispaniola (the Dominican Republic and Haiti), Jamaica, the Leeward Islands, Puerto Rico, and the Windward Islands in the Caribbean, as well as southeastern Mexico and Venezuela. In Florida, it occurs in the Florida Keys, where it is not uncommon, and where it was first discovered by J. L. Blodgett. It typically grows in the shade of larger trees in dense forests dominated by Sideroxylon, Lysiloma, Swietenia, Bursera, Hypelate, Dipholis, and Nectandra.
It was one of the first American trees to draw European attention, and is mentioned in accounts of many early voyages to the Americas; one early account notes, "We found there a tree whose leaf had the finest smell of cloves that I have ever met with; it was like a laurel leaf, but not so large: but I think it was a species of laurel." Its white bark, brilliant deep green foliage, and crimson fruit make it one of the most ornamental small trees native to southern Florida. It was introduced to England in 1738, and first cultivated in Europe by Philip Miller.
