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Additional Resources:

Family:

Lecythidaceae (Magnoliophyta)

Primary Citation:

Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 44: 31. 1987

Accepted Name:

This name is currently accepted.

Description:

Author: Scott A. Mori

Type: Guyana. Kumuparu Creek, Demerara River, 150 feet aIt., 5 Nov 1937 (fl), Forest Dept. British Guiana 2557 (lectotype, NY; isolectotypes, K-2 sheets, MAD).

Description: Trees, usually canopy, (15-)20-35 m tall, unbuttressed. Twigs 2-4 mm diam. Bark smooth, sometimes with vertical cracks. Leaves not deciduous just before flowering: petioles 6-12 mm long, glabrous; blades elliptic to narrowly elliptic, 6-10(-13.5) x 3-6 cm, glabrous, chartaceous, the base obtuse, the margins entire, the apex acuminate; secondary veins in 8-14 pairs. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, of simple racemes or once-branched paniculate arrangements of racemes, the principal rachis 3-17 cm long; pedicels jointed, 1-5 mm long below joint, 4-10 mm long above joint, tuberculate or rugose, green, pink or reddish, with caducous bract at base and two caducous bracteoles inserted directly below joint. Flowers 2-2.5 cm diam.; calyx with 6 ovate to very widely ovate, green or reddish lobes, 4-8 x 3-6 mm; petals 6, subequal, widely obovate, 14-19 x 10-19 mm, usually pink to purple, infrequently white; hood of androecium flat, 17 x 13 mm, usually pink to purple, infrequently white, the appendages antherless, when pink with white apices; ligule with well-developed lateral flanges; staminal ring with 110-175 dimorphic stamens, the outermost strongly curved inwards, question mark shaped, 4-5 mm long, the innermost straight, 1-2 mm long, the anthers yellow, 0.4-0.5 mm long; hypanthium tuberculate or rugose, pubescent, cuneate at base; ovary 4-locular, each locule with 3-4 ovules attached on lower part of septum, the summit truncate, the style geniculate, 4.5 mm long. Fruits narrowly conical, 3-5.5 (excluding operculum) x 2.5-4.5 cm, the pericarp usually inconspicuously rugose, 3-4 mm thick.

Common names: Guyana: kakaralli (applied to several species of Eschweilera and Lecythis), wena kakaralli, wirimiri. French Guiana: mahot blanc, weti loabi. Brazil: ripeiro vermelho.

Distribution: Found throughout the Guianas into Amapá, Brazil. Collections have also been gathered from around Manaus and from the vicinity of the Tucuruí Dam in Pará.

Ecology: A species of non-flooded forest.

Phenology: Lecythis confertiflora flowers most profusely from Sep to Dec.

Pollination: In Lecythis confertiflora, the anthers of the staminal ring are white except for the yellow anthers adjacent to the appendage-free ligule. A glistening secretion at the base of the appendages of the hood appears to be nectar. Consequently, the flowers of this taxon may produce nectar in the hood as well as fodder pollen in part of the staminal ring. The flowers open before daybreak and fall in the later afternoon of the same day. A single euglossine, Euglossa decorata has been captured visiting the flowers of L. confertiflora. It visited the flowers in the early morning and entered as many as six flowers in succession, spending from five to 60 seconds in each. Although this bee may revisit flowers, the second visit lasted only one to two seconds. A metallic green species of Euglossa was also observed to enter flowers on several occasions but it was not captured. All the euglossines enter the flowers with their ventral surfaces toward the androecial hood, but our observations did not enable us to determine if the bees took “nectar” from the hood or fodder pollen from the staminal ring. The euglossines we observed were large enough to fill the space between the hood and the staminal ring; thus, their heads and thoraces came in contact with the fertile stamens of the staminal ring and the stigma when they were collecting pollinator rewards from the hood. Other, smaller bees were observed visiting the flowers but their heads and thoraces did not touch the reproductive parts when they were collecting a reward from the hood and, therefore, they are probably not efficient pollinators (Mori & Boeke, 1987).

Dispersal: No information recorded. This species, however, has a basal aril and it is likely that bats may disperse the seeds.

Predation: No observations recorded.

Field characters: This species is characterized by the 1) leaf blades usually less than 10 cm long, 2) cylindric trunk, 3) more-or less smooth bark, 4) flower color usually pink or red but sometimes white, 5) flat androecial hood and vestigial anthers of the hood mostly without anthers, and 5) long conical fruits with a rugose pericarp. Closely related to L. idatimon but differs in features discussed in taxonomic notes (see below).

Taxonomic notes: Lecythis confertiflora is morphologically similar to L. idatimon. The two species are phenologically separated and display slight but consistent morphological differences. In a study of the Lecythidaceae of La Fumée Mountain, French Guiana (Mori & Prance, 1987), it was noted that L. confertiflora always flowered before L. idatimon. This was later confirmed in Amapá, Brazil where I and others have collected the two species side by side but always in different phenological states. Morphologically the two species differ in the (1) canopy vs. understory habit; (2) chartaceous vs. coriaceous leaves; (3) smaller leaves; (4) smooth vs. rugose fruits; and (5) more narrowly conical fruits of L. confertiflora. However, there is overlap in most of these features. For example, 52% of the fertile collections of L. confertiflora were collected from trees over 25 m whereas only 13% of the collections of L. idatimon came from trees this large. Likewise, most of the collections of L. confertiflora have their largest leaves under 10 cm long while those of L. idatimon are over this length. Nevertheless, when all these features are considered, it is possible to place all collections in one species or the other. The fruits of L. confertiflora are smooth or are only slightly rugose while those of L. idatimon are usually markedly turbinate.

Conservation: IUCN Red List: Not on list.

Uses: None recorded.

Etymology: The epithet refers to the abundant flowers but they are widely spaced along the rachis and not tightly compacted as the epithet implies.

Source: This species page is based on Mori in Mori & Prance, 1990.

Acknowledgements: We are grateful to C. Gracie for allowing us to use her images to illustrate the characters of this species.

Flora and Monograph Treatment(s):

Lecythis confertiflora (A.C.Sm.) S.A.Mori: [Article] Prance, Ghillean T. & Mori, S. A. 1979. Lecythidaceae - Part I. The actinomorphic-flowered New World Lecythidaceae (Asteranthos, Gustavia, Grias, Allantoma & Cariniana). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 21: 1-270.
Lecythis confertiflora (A.C.Sm.) S.A.Mori: [Article] Mori, S. A. 1987. The Lecythidaceae of a lowland Neotropical Forest: La Fumée mountain, French Guiana. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 44: 1-190.