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Family:

Melastomataceae (Magnoliophyta)

Primary Citation:

Mem. Wern. Nat. Hist. Soc. 4: 309. 1823

Accepted Name:

This name is currently accepted.

Common Names:

soapbush, kui, Koster's curse, roinisinga, soapbush, kaurasiga, soap bush, mbona na mbulamakau

Description:

Description Author and Date: Frank Almeda, based on Almeda, F. (2009). Melastomataceae. In: G. Davidse, M. Sousa-Sânchez, S. Knapp, & F. Chiang (eds.), Flora Mesoamericana: Cucurbitaceae a Polemoniaceae. 4(1): 164-338.

Type: Holotype: Jamaica, P. Browne s.n. (LINN).

Description: Shrubs 0.5-2 m tall, the branchlets, petioles, leaf veins below, inflorescences, and hypanthia moderately to sparsely setose (the hairs caducously gland-tipped in part), underlain with a sparse stellulate-puberulent ground layer. Leaves 5-7-nerved, ovate to oblong-ovate, 5-16 cm long, 3.2-8 cm wide, above moderately strigose with smooth hairs mostly 2 mm long, apex acuminate, base rounded to subcordate, the margin ciliate-crenulate. Inflorescence a pseudolateral cyme 2-3 cm long branched at or near the base; flowers 5-merous, pedicels 0.5-1 mm long, the subulate bracteoles 0.5-1 X 0.5 mm. Calyx lobes broadly depressed-ovate, 1 X 1.5 mm, greatly exceeded by the subulate to linear exterior teeth 2-4 mm long, the torus within bearing 10 triangular, fimbriate-ciliolate scales 0.5-1 mm long. Petals white, glabrous, oblong to obovate-oblong, 8-10 X 3-5 mm. Filaments 2-3 mm long; anther sacs white, 4-5 mm long with a dorsally inclined pore; connective prolonged into a blunt dorso-basal spur 0.3-0.5 mm long. Ovary 5-locular, 1/3 inferior, the apical cone 0.5 mm high crowned by a tubular, distally lobulate collar 0.5 mm long; berry 6-8 mm diam, dark blue to purple when ripe. Seeds rugulate or granulate, dark brown, 0.7 mm long.

Habitat and Distribution: Common, disturbed sites, rain forest margins. 0-1000 m. Southern Mexico (Guerrero and Veracruz southward), West Indies to all the Guianas south to Bolivia and southern Brazil. MEXICO: Chiapas (Ton 3081, DS); BELIZE (Gentle 8965, US); GUATEMALA (Lundell 16412, CAS); HONDURAS (Croat & Hannon 64481, CAS); EL SALVADOR (Calderón 1226, US); NICARAGUA (Stevens 32689, CAS); COSTA RICA (Almeda 2696, CAS); PANAMA (Herrera 95, CAS).

Taxonomy and Systematics: The typical variety of this species, which is the only one known in Central America, is also a naturalized pernicious weed in much of the paleotropics from Tanzania and Madagascar through Malaysia south to Fiji and north to Hawai'i.

Notes: [Description based only on Mesoamerican specimens.]

Flora and Monograph Treatment(s):

Clidemia hirta (L.) D.Don: [Article] Maguire, Bassett, et al. 1953. The Botany of the Guayana Highland. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 8 (2): 87-160.