Taxus brevifolia

The Pacific yew (Taxus brevifolia) is a plant that belongs to the family of the yew family (Taxaceae).

The Pacific yew is an evergreen shrub or breitkroniger often krummstämmiger tree, the height of up to 15 rare (also 25) meters and a trunk diameter of 0.5 to 1.4 meters to a maximum reached. The scaly bark is purple to reddish. The bark of the branches is at first green, then red-brown. The seemingly double row arranged on the branches of needle leaves are 8-35 mm long and 1-3 mm wide. You have a short (5-8 mm) stem.

The Pacific yew is dioecious unisexual (dioecious),. Which are individually or in groups of one-year branches standing male cones first globular, green, and have a diameter of 1.5 mm. The female cones are oval, square and two to have a diameter of about 5 to 6.5 mm. The late summer to autumn ripening seeds are enveloped by a red aril, which has a diameter of about 10 mm.

The Pacific yew is native in the Pacific North America. It occurs along the coast of Alaska prior to Mittelkalifornien. Eastward it penetrates up to Idaho and extends up to altitudes of 2100 meters. The Pacific yew grows preferably in moist, shady locations.

Since 1980, the Pacific yew tree known for its ingredient paclitaxel, an important drug in the treatment of breast and ovarian cancer. The Pacific yew is a protected species but even this she is one of the slowest growing trees in the world. A drug isolated from its bark (where the tree is killed) is therefore hardly possible in a larger scale. It would require six 100 year old trees in order to gain enough paclitaxel for the treatment of a single cancer patient. Meanwhile, paclitaxel can be obtained semi-synthetically from cultivated specimens of the much more common European yew.

Source: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pazifische_Eibe
See Also: sending flowers, online florist