Taxon Details: Lecythis persistens Sagot
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Narratives:
Additional Resources:
Link to GenBank sequence data for Lecythis persistens
Protologue of Lecythis persistens.
Link to GenBank sequence data for Lecythis persistens Protologue of Lecythis persistens.Family:
Lecythidaceae (Magnoliophyta)
Lecythidaceae (Magnoliophyta)
Scientific Name:
Lecythis persistens Sagot
Lecythis persistens Sagot
Primary Citation:
Ann. Sci. Nat., Bot. VI, 20: 201. 1885
Ann. Sci. Nat., Bot. VI, 20: 201. 1885
Accepted Name:
This name is currently accepted.
This name is currently accepted.
Description:
Author: Scott A. Mori
Type: French Guiana. Without locality, 1842 (fl), Melinon 59 (lectotype, P, photo NY, designated Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 21(II). 1990).
Description: Trees, to 35 m tall. Twigs gray, rimose, glabrous, 2.5-4.5 mm diam., lenticels, when present, vertically oriented. Bark brown or reddish brown, smooth when young, with vertical cracks when older. Leaves not deciduous just before anthesis; petioles 10-20 mm long, glabrous, canaliculate; blades narrowly to widely elliptic or infrequently oblong, 11-29 x 6-12.5 cm, glabrous, coriaceous, the base obtuse, the margins entire, revolute, with scars left by caducous hairs, the apex acute to short acuminate; secondary veins in 11-23 pairs. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, simple racemes or once-branched paniculate arrangements of racemes, the principal rachis 4-11 cm long, with 6-15 widely spaced flowers and dense, ferrugineous pubescence; pedicels jointed, 5-10 mm long below joint, 10-22 mm long above joint, rugose, the bract caducous, not seen, the bracteoles oblong, 7.5 x 4.5 mm. Flowers 3-6 cm diam.; calyx with 6 ovate to very widely ovate, 6-11 x 5-10 mm, green or green tinged with red lobes; petals six, widely obovate to very widely obovate, 19-32 x 14-26 mm, white; androecium: staminal ring with 19-320 dimorphic stamens, the outermost filaments curved inwards, in form of question mark, 9-12 mm long, the innermost filaments ± straight, 33.5 mm long, the anthers 0.7-2 mm long, white; appendage-free ligule with lateral flanges; hood flat, 20-25 x 17-20 mm, white or reddish-orange, the appendages with yellow or orange anthers; hypanthium rugose, pubescent, cuneate at base; ovary 4-locular, each locule with 6-31 ovules attached on lower part of septum, the summit truncate, the style geniculate, 4-10 mm long. Fruits turbinate, 2.5-6 (excluding operculum) x 3-7.5 cm, the supracalycine zone poorly developed or well developed and erect, the infracalycine zone cuneate, the base often prolonged into woody stalk; pericarp 2-7 mm thick, sometimes oozing viscid mucilage when cut, the operculum flat, with style persisting as woody spine. Seeds 2.8 x 1.5 cm; white aril basal, 1.5 cm long, white.
Common names: See descriptions of each of the subspecies.
Distribution: Lecythis persistens is known from Guyana, French Guiana, and Amapá, Brazil.
Ecology: This species is an understory to canopy tree of non-flooded forest.
Phenology: See descriptions of each of the subspecies.
Pollination: See descriptions of each of the subspecies.
Dispersal: see description of each of the subspecies.
Predation: No observations recorded.
Field characters: An understory or canopy tree with a cyclindric trunk and smooth bark; petals white; androecial hood with yellow vestigial anthers. The androecial hood of subsp. aurantiaca ranges from intensely orange to white tinged with orange while that of subsp. persistens is usually white but sometimes has a bluish-tinge.
Taxonomic notes: This species has been commonly misidentified as Lecythis amara Aubl. However, I have placed this name in synonymy with L. idatimon Aubl., a morphologically similar but different species, because Aublet's specimens of L. amara at BM and S match the type of L. idatimon. See L. idatimon for a further discussion of this problem. Lecythis persistens is morphologically similar to L. idatimon. hese two taxa, along with L. confertiflora and L. pneumatophora, are the only species of Lecythis with rugose hypanthia, lateral flanges on the ligule, and markedly dimorphic stamens in the staminal ring. Their flowers differ in the antheriferous hood appendages of L. persistens and the antherless ones of L. confertiflora and L. idatimon. Vegetatively, L. persistens and L. idatimonare difficult to separate. Lecythis persistens tends to have bigger, more oblong, and more coriaceous leaves, and more pronounced tertiary and higher orders of venation. The inflorescences of L. persistens are more ferrugineous pubescent, and its pedicel bases, which persist on the rachis, are longer. Flower color helps to differentiate these species. The petals of L. persistens are completely white whereas those of L. idatimon are either pink or red or white tinged with pink or red. In 1978 (Mori et aI., 1978), I mistakenly identified this species as L. alba Aubl., a name which is not validly published. Lecythis corrugata also has rugose hypanthia and belongs to this group for the androecial hood is dorsiventrally thickened. In a molecular analysis of Lecythidaceae (Mori et al., 2007), L. persistens subsp. persistens is sister to L. pneumatophora and to L. persistens subsp. aurantiaca which suggests that these two taxa should be treated as separate species.
Uses: None recorded.
Etymology: The species epithet refers to the persistent lower part of the pedicel/hypanthium, i.e., the part below the pedicellar articulation.
Author: Scott A. Mori
Type: French Guiana. Without locality, 1842 (fl), Melinon 59 (lectotype, P, photo NY, designated Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 21(II). 1990).
Description: Trees, to 35 m tall. Twigs gray, rimose, glabrous, 2.5-4.5 mm diam., lenticels, when present, vertically oriented. Bark brown or reddish brown, smooth when young, with vertical cracks when older. Leaves not deciduous just before anthesis; petioles 10-20 mm long, glabrous, canaliculate; blades narrowly to widely elliptic or infrequently oblong, 11-29 x 6-12.5 cm, glabrous, coriaceous, the base obtuse, the margins entire, revolute, with scars left by caducous hairs, the apex acute to short acuminate; secondary veins in 11-23 pairs. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, simple racemes or once-branched paniculate arrangements of racemes, the principal rachis 4-11 cm long, with 6-15 widely spaced flowers and dense, ferrugineous pubescence; pedicels jointed, 5-10 mm long below joint, 10-22 mm long above joint, rugose, the bract caducous, not seen, the bracteoles oblong, 7.5 x 4.5 mm. Flowers 3-6 cm diam.; calyx with 6 ovate to very widely ovate, 6-11 x 5-10 mm, green or green tinged with red lobes; petals six, widely obovate to very widely obovate, 19-32 x 14-26 mm, white; androecium: staminal ring with 19-320 dimorphic stamens, the outermost filaments curved inwards, in form of question mark, 9-12 mm long, the innermost filaments ± straight, 33.5 mm long, the anthers 0.7-2 mm long, white; appendage-free ligule with lateral flanges; hood flat, 20-25 x 17-20 mm, white or reddish-orange, the appendages with yellow or orange anthers; hypanthium rugose, pubescent, cuneate at base; ovary 4-locular, each locule with 6-31 ovules attached on lower part of septum, the summit truncate, the style geniculate, 4-10 mm long. Fruits turbinate, 2.5-6 (excluding operculum) x 3-7.5 cm, the supracalycine zone poorly developed or well developed and erect, the infracalycine zone cuneate, the base often prolonged into woody stalk; pericarp 2-7 mm thick, sometimes oozing viscid mucilage when cut, the operculum flat, with style persisting as woody spine. Seeds 2.8 x 1.5 cm; white aril basal, 1.5 cm long, white.
Common names: See descriptions of each of the subspecies.
Distribution: Lecythis persistens is known from Guyana, French Guiana, and Amapá, Brazil.
Ecology: This species is an understory to canopy tree of non-flooded forest.
Phenology: See descriptions of each of the subspecies.
Pollination: See descriptions of each of the subspecies.
Dispersal: see description of each of the subspecies.
Predation: No observations recorded.
Field characters: An understory or canopy tree with a cyclindric trunk and smooth bark; petals white; androecial hood with yellow vestigial anthers. The androecial hood of subsp. aurantiaca ranges from intensely orange to white tinged with orange while that of subsp. persistens is usually white but sometimes has a bluish-tinge.
Taxonomic notes: This species has been commonly misidentified as Lecythis amara Aubl. However, I have placed this name in synonymy with L. idatimon Aubl., a morphologically similar but different species, because Aublet's specimens of L. amara at BM and S match the type of L. idatimon. See L. idatimon for a further discussion of this problem. Lecythis persistens is morphologically similar to L. idatimon. hese two taxa, along with L. confertiflora and L. pneumatophora, are the only species of Lecythis with rugose hypanthia, lateral flanges on the ligule, and markedly dimorphic stamens in the staminal ring. Their flowers differ in the antheriferous hood appendages of L. persistens and the antherless ones of L. confertiflora and L. idatimon. Vegetatively, L. persistens and L. idatimonare difficult to separate. Lecythis persistens tends to have bigger, more oblong, and more coriaceous leaves, and more pronounced tertiary and higher orders of venation. The inflorescences of L. persistens are more ferrugineous pubescent, and its pedicel bases, which persist on the rachis, are longer. Flower color helps to differentiate these species. The petals of L. persistens are completely white whereas those of L. idatimon are either pink or red or white tinged with pink or red. In 1978 (Mori et aI., 1978), I mistakenly identified this species as L. alba Aubl., a name which is not validly published. Lecythis corrugata also has rugose hypanthia and belongs to this group for the androecial hood is dorsiventrally thickened. In a molecular analysis of Lecythidaceae (Mori et al., 2007), L. persistens subsp. persistens is sister to L. pneumatophora and to L. persistens subsp. aurantiaca which suggests that these two taxa should be treated as separate species.
Uses: None recorded.
Etymology: The species epithet refers to the persistent lower part of the pedicel/hypanthium, i.e., the part below the pedicellar articulation.
Flora and Monograph Treatment(s):
Lecythis persistens Sagot: [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 persistens Sagot: [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.