Bothriospora is a monotypic genus of trees that grow in riverine forest in the Amazon basin. It is characterized by its woody habit and riverine habitat, and by its rather small ovate to elliptic leaves, narrowly triangular interpetiolar stipules that are long-acute and quickly caducous, multiflowered but rather short terminal cymose inflorescences, 5-merous homostylous flowers, rather small white corollas (tubes 1.5-3 mm long) with the lobes imbricated in bud; 4 linear stigmas; and small yellow bacciform fruits with 4 cells and two or several ellipsoid rather large seeds in each locule. The leaves have crypt-type domatia with a tuft of pilose pubescence covering them on the lower surface, in the axils of the secondary veins and often also the tertiary veins. The stamens are exserted with well developed filaments, and these and the corolla lobes are strongly reflexed at anthesis. The stigmas elongate and become exserted as the staminate phase finishes. These stigmas are papillose and perhaps receptive all along the adaxial face, and shortly truncate to broadened at the tips and sometimes apparently geniculate there.

Bothriospora is often overlooked, because the genus is not well known (and it is sometimes confused with Botryarrhena because of the similarity of the names of these genera, neither of which is well known). Bothriospora is similar to Calycophyllum, in particular to Calycophyllum spruceanum, which however has calyptrate stipules and capsular fruits. In a molecular systematic study Kainulainen et al. (2010; as Condamineeae) found Bothriospora in the Tribe Dialypetalantheae, and related to Wittmackanthus and Dialypetalanthus.

Author: C.M. Taylor
The content of this web page was last revised on 8 December 2022.
Taylor web page: http://www.mobot.org/MOBOT/Research/curators/taylor.shtml

• Kainulainen, K., C. H. Persson, T. Eriksson & B. Bremer. 2010. Molecular systematics and morphological character evolution of the Condamineeae (Rubiaceae). Amer. J. Bot. 97(12): 1961–1981.