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Family:

Melastomataceae (Magnoliophyta)

Primary Citation:

Brittonia 3: 127. 1939

Accepted Name:

This name is currently accepted.

Type Specimens:

Specimen 1: Type -- J. N. Rose

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: Mexico, Rose 1963 (NY!).

Description: Shrub 1-3 m, the uppermost rounded-quadrate internodes, petioles, and inflorescence rachis moderately to densely beset with a widely to somewhat retrorsely spreading indument of plumose and barbellate hairs, occasionally intermixed with some smooth hairs 0.5-1.5 mm long. Leaves of a pair somewhat unequal in size but not markedly so; blades 7-18.7 x 4-9.5 cm, ovate, 5-7-nerved or if 5-7-plinerved then the innermost pair of primary veins diverging from the midvein 0.4-1 cm above the blade base, apex acuminate, base rounded to subcordate (sometimes obliquely so), the margin denticulate to crenulate and ciliate, the adaxial surface moderately covered with appressed to spreading smooth hairs 0.25-1 mm long, the abaxial surface moderately to copiously covered with a mixture of spreading plumose, barbellate and smooth hairs 0.5-0.75 mm long with spreading smooth hairs 0.5-1 mm long on the higher order veins and actual surface. Inflorescence a pseudolateral modified dichasium 3.5-8 cm long laxly and divaricately branched from the base with flowers mostly in clusters of two to six terminating the branchlets, flowers 5-merous on pedicels 0.5-1 mm long but often appearing nearly sessile; bracteoles subulate-aristate, persistent but often obscured by the indument at the nodes, 0.5-1 x 0.2 mm. Hypanthium densely to moderately covered with retrorsely spreading barbellate or roughened hairs 0.5-1 mm long. Calyx lobes 2 x 1-1.5 mm, ovate to ovate-triangular, ± scarious and glabrous or sometimes minutely glandular on one or both surfaces; exterior calyx teeth subulate, 2.5-5 mm long with an indument like the hypanthium. Petals glabrous, white, oblong to narrowly obovate, 4-10 x 2.5 mm. Filaments 2.5 m long, anthers 2.5 mm long, yellow with a somewhat dorsally inclined pore; connective thickened dorsally but neither prolonged nor appendaged dorso-basally. Ovary 5-locular, 2/3 inferior, apex glabrous and somewhat tapered to a truncate cone. Berry purple-black when ripe, 7-8 x 6-7 mm when dry. Seeds 0.5 mm long, the testa shallowly rugulate.

Habitat and Distribution: Pine-oak forests. 920-1800 m. Southern and western Mexico (Guerrero, Jalisco, Michoacán, Nayarit, Oaxaca). MEXICO: Chiapas (Breedlove 25356, CAS); GUATEMALA (Steyermark 51074, F).

Taxonomy and Systematics: Clidemia submontana and C. laxiflora form a closely related species pair and they have been confused repeatedly in the past. In the latter species the berries are widest at the middle (vs. widest basally), the calyx teeth are filiform (vs. subulate to narrowly triangular), the hypanthial hairs are widely spreading and underlain with a sparse cover of minute glands (vs. retrorsely spreading with no ground layer of glands); the petals are pink and 2.5-3 mm long (vs. white and 4-10 mm long), and the floral pedicels (at anthesis) are 2.5-3.5 m long (vs. 0.5-1 mm long).

Notes: [Description based only on Mesoamerican specimens.]