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Family:

Ericaceae (Magnoliophyta)

Primary Citation:

Fl. Bras. (Martius) 7: 172. 1863

Accepted Name:

This name is currently accepted.

Description:

Description: Slender, wiry or virgate, to stout, erect shrub 0.2-1 m tall; mature stems terete, glabrous; bark smooth and lustrous, or cracking reticulately; twigs terete to subterete, short-white pilose, glabrate, or very rarely glabrous. Leaves in whorls of 4, imbricate, ± appressed or more commonly spreading, elliptic to linear-elliptic, or ± oblong, 3.5-8 x 1.2-2.2(-2.5) mm, base tapering, broadly cuneate, short-decurrent, apex blunt to acute (keeled), mucronate with a deciduous, translucent, glandular or eglandular seta 0.3-0.8(-1.3) mm long, apparent margin usually minutely ciliate over entire length, also ± pectinate with few to many, deciduous, translucent, (branched) setae 0.8-2.2 mm long, these usually tipped with deciduous, minutely spherical to cylindric, reddish glands, otherwise lamina glabrous and nitid to densely puberulous, or short-pilose all over and then glabrate; petiole subterete, puberulent above, 1-2 mm long, ciliate. Inflorescence axillary, flowers 4-7 clustered at tips; floral bract leaf-like in all aspects; pedicel terete, striate, (10-)15-22(-50) mm long, densely short-white-pilose (glabrous), also usually densely glandular-hispid with setae often of varying lengths to 1.3 mm long (eglandular), setae also often minutely pilose at base (bifid to thinly-branched at apex); bracteoles leaf-like but 4-5 mm long. Flowers (5-)6(-7)-merous; calyx 4.5-10 mm long, lobes spreading, flat to keeled, ovate to linear-ovate, 4-9 mm long, long-acuminate, long-mucronate, densely puberulent to short-pilose all over including inner surface, also moderately to densely glandular-hispid at margin and dorsally with trichomes to 1.2(-2) mm long (eglandular); petals erect or spreading and then corolla ± campanulate (imbricate, then corolla ± campanulate-urceolate), obovate, rarely oblong-obelliptic, ca. 10-16 x (4-)5-12 mm, rounded or rarely obtuse, margin conspicuously erose (entire), scarlet to brick-red (salmon-red) when fresh, glabrous (puberulent within); stamens 5-7 mm long; filaments 2.5-5.5 mm long; anthers 2.5-3(-4) mm long; ovary glabrous to weakly puberulent; style usually verrucose at base, 2.5-3 mm long, glabrous. Capsule ovoid to globose, 6-7(-9) x 5-6 mm.

Distribution: Endemic to Venezuelan Guayana and adjacent Brazil, where it is widely distributed and common in the Gran Sabana and various tepuis of Bolívar state, and less frequent in Amazonas state; one collection has been made from Brazil, in the vicinity of Cerro de La Neblina. It is found in open, rocky, dry or wet savannas, along stream banks, on boulders and sandstone outcrops, and in the herbaceous strata of open vegetation, at elevations from 1000 m in the Gran Sabanna to 2685 m on Cerro Marahuaca. Flowering and fruiting appear to be continuous throughout the season.

Cultivated: BONN

Illustrated: Acta Bot. Venez. 2(5-8): 289, fig. 18. 1967 and Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 29: 150, fig. 77A-J. 1978.

Type: Guyana (British Guiana), Dec (fl), R. H. Schomburgk l5 (or l548) (lectotype, K, photo NY s.n.). The protologue cites the type collection as Schomburgk l548, while the two sheets at K show the number to be l5 (although it could be misread as l548). I can not be certain from which herbarium Meissner saw his original specimen, but the only extant specimens appear to be at K (2x); therefore, I am citing one of the K sheets as the lectotype.

Flora and Monograph Treatment(s):

Ledothamnus guyanensis Meisn.: [Article] Luteyn, James L., et al. 1995. Ericaceae, Part II. The Superior-Ovaried Genera (Monotropoideae, Pyroloideae, Rhododendroideae, and Vaccinioideae P.P.). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 66: 560.