Esenbeckia grandiflora Mart.

  • Authority

    Kaastra, Roelof C. 1982. A monograph of the Pilocarpinae (Rutaceae). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 33: 1-198. (Published by NYBG Press)

  • Family

    Rutaceae

  • Scientific Name

    Esenbeckia grandiflora Mart.

  • Description

    Species Description - Shrub or small tree to 7(-10) m tall with trunk 3.5-8 cm diam, but to 20 cm in Venezuela; bark full of cracks, indument of ferrugineous-hyaline hairs to 0.3 mm long; branchlets 2-5 mm diam., dark reddish-brown, later on grayish, glabrate but younger branchlets (dispersedly) strigillose. Leaves alternate or some (sub)opposite, often crowded at tips of branchlets, 1-foliolate, the leaflet sessile; petiole terete, slightly canaliculate when mature, becoming transversely cracked, with a turgid joint just proximally of the leaflet, glabrous or minutely puberulous, leaflet-blade (narrowly) obovate to (narrowly) elliptic, at base narrowly cuneate to attenuate, apex obtuse, shortly subacuminate or somewhat roundish or rarely rounded, margin (sub)revolute, ± rigid-coriaceous, dull or occasionally shining, glabrous above, sparsely minutely puberulous beneath when young, venation brochidodromous, main veins prominent beneath, midvein proximally slightly impressed above. Inflorescences terminal, or axillary at tips of branchlets, erect, (narrowly) paniculate, usually few-flowered, densely, or rarely sparsely, strigillose; side-branchlets all or only those of higher order opposite, shorter than the leaves; bracts and bractlets alternate or opposite, (broadly) triangular, concave-conduplicate, coriaceous, papillose towards the base above, strigillose below, with a prominent false midrib and parallel nerves; pedicels 1.5-5 mm long. Flowers 7.5-14 mm in diam., calyx lobes quincuncial, very broadly ovate to subcircular, obtuse or rounded, very thickly coriaceous, glabrous above, the nerves externally not visible, parallel and slightly branched towards the tip, provided with a median false midrib on the back; petals mostly deciduous, contorted to the right or rarely cochlear, very widely spreading, ovate to elliptic, obtuse, nerves externally not visible, subparallel and slightly branching towards the tip, the median nerve somewhat thicker, usually without false midrib; filaments subulate, somewhat complanate, 2-3.5 mm long, some glands present, dorsally near base with some hairs to 0.1 mm long, or glabrous; anthers dropping off early, heart-shaped, 0.7-1.5 × 0.6-1.2 mm, including a mucronate tip 0.1 mm; disc annular, forming a ± distinct pentangle, the angles sulcate, the sides obsoletely or scarcely lobed, 0.7-1.5 mm high and ca. 0.5 mm thick above, 2.5-4 mm in diam., fleshy, swollen towards the tip, glabrous, sometimes with granules, rarely somewhat pilose; carpels depressedly globose, 5-lobed with shallow broad grooves, completely connate and often with their lower part immersed in the receptacle, glabrous, very densely provided with clavate to finger-like, blunt-pointed protuberances which are finely granulate and glandular at anthesis, 1 or 2 of the longest protuberances standing midway on the carpels; style inserted midway on the carpels just above an elevated part of the receptacle, to 2 mm long and 0.4-0.5 mm thick, with hyaline hairs near base to 0.3 mm long; stigma capitate or clavate, ± distinctly 5-lobed, 0.5-0.8 × 0.6-1 mm, with 5 large glands which sometimes later disappear leaving the stigma 5-pitted. Fruits (4-)5-locular, globose, 15-35 (when dehisced to 40) mm in diam., echinate with broadly based, mostly slightly curved pyramidal prickles to 3.5-4(-5) mm long, becoming glabrous when mature, dehiscent septicidally from 3-4 mm above base mostly not up to the axis, and loculicidally to 1/6 or 1/3 from base; endocarp bearing impressions of the nerves of the exocarp; seeds 1 or 2 per loculus, superposed, obliquely tear-shaped, 9-13(-15) × 5.5-7.5 mm, truncate, or at base either flattened when there are 2, ventrally obliquely flattened when only 1, apex very shortly beaked or somewhat truncate, testa dull brown, finely reticulate with interspaces to ca. 0.1 mm; chalazal area roundish, contracted towards apex, to 5 or 7 mm long, black; hilum to 0.7-1.5 mm broad, gradually contracted towards apex; black caruncle present above the micropyle; embryos up to 8, one fully developed, the others smaller or vestigial and crowded around the tip of the large one, this very thick, cotyledons unequal, punctate, radicle to 0.7 mm long and projecting beyond ears of cotyledons.