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(Last Modified On 11/14/2012)
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(Last Modified On 11/14/2012)
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Species
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HIRTELLA AMERICANA L.
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PlaceOfPublication
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Sp. P1. 34. 1753
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Reference
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Standl. & Steyerm. in Fieldiana, Bot. 24:450. 1946.
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Synonym
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Hirtella inollicoina HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 7:263. 1825; Hemsl. in Biol. Centr.-Am. Bot. 1:366. 1880, as inollissima; Standl. in Contr. U. S. Nat. Herb. 27:188. 1928. ?Hirtella glandulosa Spreng. Anleit., pl. 7, f. I-4; Neue. Entd. 1:303. 1820; DC. Prodr. 2:528. 1825; Seem. Bot. Voy. Herald, 118. 1852-53. Hirtella guatemalensis Standl. in Trop. Woods 11:19. 1927.
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Description
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Small or medium-sized tree, the branchlets and inflorescences conspicuously rufous, densely short-hirsute with straight, slender, multicellular tawny hairs 0.5-0.7 mm. long; branchlets 2-4 mm. in diameter below the inflorescence, the hairs persistent. Leaves hairy like the stems but less densely, the upper surface glabrate in age except the; midrib, the lower surface densely hairy on the principal veins and uniformly but sparsely so on the anastomosing veinlets, where the hairs are often about 3 times as long as the distance between them; hairs of the leaves with enlarged papillose bases; leaf-blades thick and subcoriaceous, oblong or elliptic, acute and gradually short-acuminate at apex, rather abruptly rounded or obtuse at base, 3-6 cm. wide, 6-15 cm. long, often 2-2.7 times as long as wide; lateral veins 8-12 pairs, arcuate, slightly impressed above, raised beneath, the small veinlets finely reticulate and often raised on the upper surface, making it rough to the touch; glands abundant on the lower surface, usually concentrated near base and apex of the blade, elliptic or circular, 0.2-0.5 mm. across, with raised rim and depressed center; petioles very stout, 2-4 mm. long and about 2 mm. thick, their surfaces concealed by the hairs; stipules subpersistent, hirsute, subulate, appressed, 6-9 mm. long. Flowers many, white or purplish-white, in very narrow spike-like leafless panicles 10-20 cm. long and 2-4 cm. thick, the lateral branches of the spike often about 1.5 cm. long, ascending, cymosely 1- or few-flowered; bracts of the cymes round or oval, 1-1.5 mm. long, heavily beset with large glands, these varying from depressed spots 0.3 mm. across to peltate glands 1 mm. across on stalks 1 mm. long, the larger glands often very numerous and conspicuous in the spikes after the abortion of most of the flowers; bracts subtending the lateral cymes (i. e. those of the main axis) eglandular or nearly so, hirsute, subulate, about 5 mm. long; petals white, broadly elliptic, bluntly rounded at base and apex, glabrous, about 4 mm. long and 3 mm. wide; stamens 3, opposite adjoining sepals, much exserted and curled into the flower, purplish or deep red, glabrous, the fila-
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Habit
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tree
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Description
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ments 1-1.2 cm. long, fleshy at base and tapering to the very slender tips, arising separately from the hypanthium-rim which is fleshy and projects about 1 mm. or a little less above the base of the calyx; anthers about 0.6 mm. long; hypanthium turbinate, the cavity funnelform, about 2 mm. deep measured from the summit of the fleshy rim, retrorsely hairy within the rim but glabrous at bottom; calyx- lobes broadly oblong, obtuse to rounded at tips, reflexed at and after anthesis, entire, 1.5-2.2 mm. wide, 2-2.7 mm. long, the outer surface thinly yellow-hirsute like the inflorescence, the inner surface pale, sordid-tomentulose; ovary hairy, sessile, attached above the middle of the hypanthium cavity (at the base of the middle stamen), the style about as long as the stamens and opposite them in the flower, filiform, long-pilose below the middle, with tiny capitate stigma, in bud bent abruptly away from the ovary and then coiled toward it. Fruit oval, thinly yellow-hairy, rounded at apex, probably 1-1.5 cm. long or longer, black.
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Distribution
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Cuba; British Honduras, Costa Rica, and Panama; Colombia and northern Venezuela; thickets and savannas, lowlands.
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Note
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A distinct entity, but probably the same species, occurs in Guatemala and southern Mexico; the pubescence in general is toward yellowish rather than reddish, the calyx-lobes are sordid-tomentulose and pale on the outer surface as well as the inner, and the glands are usually absent from the lower leaf-surfaces but are usually present on the upper.
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Specimen
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CANAL ZONE: Gatuncillo, Piper 5654; between Rio Grande and Pedro Vidal, road to Arraija'n, Pittier 2708; [Cruces, Seemann]; southwest of Pt. Salud, Barro Colorado Island, Woodworth & Vestal 728. COCLP-: Penonome, Williams 247. PANAMA: Chorrera, Killip 3409; Pacora, Bro. Paul 284; Sabanas, north of Panama', Bro. Paul 412; San Jos' Island, Erlanson 108.
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