Kings holly or Kings lomatia (Lomatia tasmanica) is a Tasmanian shrub from the family Proteaceae.The plant has shiny green leaves and bears pink flowers, but yields neither fruit nor seeds. Only one strand of Kings holly is known to be alive in the wild.

Kings holly is unusual because all of the remaining plants are genetically identical. Because it has three sets of chromosomes (a triploid) and is therefore sterile, reproduction occurs only vegetatively: when a branch falls, that branch grows new roots, establishing a new plant that is genetically identical to its parent.

Although all the plants are technically separate in that each has its own root system, they are collectively considered to be the oldest living plant clone . Each plant's life span is approximately 300 years, but the plant has been cloning itself for at least 43,600 years. This estimate is based on the radiocarbon dating of fossilized leaf fragments that were found 5.3 miles (8.5 km) away. The fossilized fragments are identical to the contemporary plant in cell structure and shape, which indicates that both plants are triploidy and therefore clones due to the extreme rarity of the occurrence of triploidy.

History

In 1937 Charles Denison "Deny" King discovered the plant while mining tin in the remote southwest of Tasmania. The Tasmanian Herbarium named the plant in King's honor after he sent specimens to be identified in the 1960s.

The plant group that King discovered in 1937 has since disappeared, and the sole remaining group of approximately 500 plants covers a 1.2 kilometer-long area in the extreme southwest of Tasmania.

References

• "Kings lomatia." Tasmanian Department of Primary Industries, Water and Environment. Accessed on January 29, 2005.
• "The Oldest Living Plant Individual." Botanical Electronic News. Accessed on January 29, 2005.