Toromiro (Sophora toromiro) is a species of tree formerly a common in the forests of Easter Island. The Toromiro fell victim to the deforestation that eliminated the island's forests by the 18th century, and it later became extinct in the wild. The tree is being reintroduced to the island in a scientific project partly led jointly by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the Göteborg Botanical Garden, where the only remaining plants of this species with a documented origin were propagated in the 1960s from seeds collected by Thor Heyerdahl. Scientific classification or biological classification is how biologists group and categorize extinct and living species of organisms. ... Divisions Land plants (embryophytes) Non-vascular plants (bryophytes) Marchantiophyta - liverworts Anthocerotophyta - hornworts Bryophyta - mosses Vascular plants (tracheophytes) Lycopodiophyta - clubmosses Equisetophyta - horsetails Pteridophyta - true ferns Psilotophyta - whisk ferns Ophioglossophyta - adderstongues Seed plants (spermatophytes) †Pteridospermatophyta - seed ferns Pinophyta - conifers Cycadophyta - cycads Ginkgophyta - ginkgo Gnetophyta - gnetae Magnoliophyta - flowering plants Adiantum pedatum (a fern... Classes Magnoliopsida - Dicots Liliopsida - Monocots The flowering plants (also called angiosperms) are a major group of land plants. ... Orders see text Dicotyledons or dicots are flowering plants whose seed typically contains two embryonic leaves or cotyledons. ... Families Fabaceae (legumes) Quillajaceae Polygalaceae (milkwort family) Surianaceae The Fabales are an order of flowering plants, included in the rosid group of dicotyledons. ... Subfamilies Faboideae Caesalpinioideae Mimosoideae References GRIN-CA 2002-09-01 The name Fabaceae belongs to either of two families, depending on viewpoint. ... Genera See text The Subfamily Faboideae is in the flowering plant family, Fabaceae. ... Species About 60-70 species, including: Sophora alopecuroides - Sophora Root Sophora chrysophylla - Mamane Sophora microphylla - Kowhai Sophora tetraptera - Kowhai Sophora toromiro - Toromiro Sophora tomentosa Sophora is a genus of about 45 species of small trees and shrubs in the subfamily Faboideae of the pea family Fabaceae. ... In biology, binomial nomenclature is the formal method of naming species. ... Location of Easter Island. ... (17th century - 18th century - 19th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 18th century refers to the century that lasted from 1701 through 1800. ... In biology and ecology, extinction is the ceasing of existence of a species or group of species. ... The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, usually referred to simply as Kew Gardens, are extensive gardens and botanical glasshouses between Richmond upon Thames and Kew in southwest London, England. ... Göteborg Botanical Garden is a leading botanical garden in Europe and the largest one in Sweden. ... Thor Heyerdahl (October 6, 1914 in Larvik, Norway–April 18, 2002 in Colla Micheri, Italy) was a world-famous Norwegian marine biologist with a great interest in anthropology, who became famous for his Kon-Tiki Expedition in which he sailed by raft 4,300 miles from South America to the...
The original subtropical moist broadleaf forests are now gone, but paleobotanical studies of fossil pollen and tree molds left by lava flows indicate that the island was formerly forested, with a range of trees, shrubs, ferns, and grasses.
A large palm, related to the Chilean wine palm (Jubaea chilensis) was one of the dominant trees, as was the toromiro tree (Sophora toromiro).
The palm is now extinct, and the toromiro is extinct in the wild, and the island is presently covered almost entirely in grassland.
The toromiro tree was already rare by the time European settlers arrived on Easter Island in the 1700s, and very little is known about this tree's natural ecology (3).
The introduction of livestock in 1866 was a further blow, as sheep, cattle and rabbits stripped the land of its remaining native plants (3).
The last recorded specimen of Sophora toromiro was seen growing on the inner slopes of the Rano Kau volcano crater, but this last tree was cut down for firewood in 1960, and another part of Easter Island's floral heritage was lost (3).
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