Ekmanianthe longiflora (Griseb.) Urb.
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Authority
Gentry, Alwyn H. 1992. Bignoniaceae--part II (Tribe Tecomeae). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 25: 1-370. (Published by NYBG Press)
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Family
Bignoniaceae
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Scientific Name
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Type
Type. Cuba. Wright 3044 (holotype, GOET; isotypes, G, GOET, MO, NY, P, S)
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Synonyms
Tecoma longiflora Griseb., Tabebuia longiflora (Griseb.) Greenm., Tabebuia grisebachii Urb.
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Description
Species Description - Tree to 18 m tall, the bark rather ridged, the branchlets scattered lepidote, sometimes with a few minute trichomes when young, drying dark with conspicuous pale elongate lenticels when young, uniformly light tan when older. Leaves (3-)5-7-foliolate, the leaflets elliptic to oblong-ovate or lanceolate, acute to acuminate at apex, rounded to broadly subcordate at base, 3-17 cm long, 1-8 cm wide, chartaceous, entire, above macroscopically rather smooth except the impressed midvein, microscopically intricately insculpted, scattered lepidote and sometimes minutely scurfy puberulous, at least the midvein somewhat puberulous, below lepidote, with tufts of simple (sometimes forked) trichomes in the axils of lateral nerves; petiolules 0.5-7 cm long, inconspicuously lepidote, the petioles 3-21 cm long, minutely puberulous with crisped whitish trichomes at apex and sometimes above. Inflorescence a few-flowered raceme or a more elongate racemose panicle with the lower branches 3-flowered, lepidote, usually more or less puberulous with crisped whitish trichomes at nodes, with small caducous linear bracteoles near top of pedicels. Flowers white (tube yellow inside when fresh), the calyx tubular, 20-30 mm long, 8-12 mm wide, subtruncate or 5-dentate to bilabiate or shortly subspathaceous, the margin usually irregularly 5-denticulate with teeth to 2 mm long, lepidote, usually with a few whitish trichomes at base of denticulations, the teeth extended as incomplete costae in upper calyx; corolla tubular-salverform, 15-22 cm long, 1.5-3 cm wide, the tube 13-18 cm long, the lobes very strongly laciniate-frilly, not very well defined, ca. 2-3 cm long, the lower tube glabrous, at top and on lobes lepidote and with a few inconspicuous scurfy trichomes; stamens four, the filaments inserted high in tube, glabrous, the anthers conspicuously exserted, pendulous, somewhat twisted, 8-12 mm long; ovary linear, 6-8 mm long, 1 mm wide, costate, very minutely lepidote-glandular, disk annular-pulvinate, ca. 1 mm long, 5 mm wide. Fruit a linear capsule, subterete, curved near base (12-[fide Leon & Alain]) 18-36 cm long, 0.8-1 cm wide, subwoody, inconspicuously longitudinally striate, scattered lepidote, drying dark, with conspicuous large warty tannish lenticels; seeds 5-7 mm long, 3-3.5 cm wide, the wings hyaline membranaceous at apex, brownish at base.
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Discussion
Now rare and currently known from only two localities in Barahona Province of the Dominican Republic (T. Zanoni, pers. comm.); it has not been collected in over 50 years in Cuba or Haiti. This unmistakable species, which has the longest flowers in tribe Tecomeae, has a complicated nomenclature despite its lack of any taxonomic problems. It was originally described as Tecoma longiflora by Grisebach but there was already a different Tecoma longiflora from Brazil. The Brazilian Tecoma longiflora was based on Vellozo’s much earlier Bignonia longiflora, itself, however, a later homonym of Bignonia longiflora Cav. Much confusion surrounds the combination in Tecoma for Vellozo’s plant, which de Candolle (1845) included under the synonymy of Tecoma speciosa DC. with this comment: “Tecoma longiflora Mart.! herb. Bignonia longiflora fl. flum. 65. 52? non Cav. Icon. fl. flum. differt a specim Martiano foliis acute et regulariter serratis.” Since Tecoma longiflora Mart. ex DC. was published in synonymy, it should not effect nomenclatural priority despite potential validation of the name by the queried reference to Vellozo’s Bignonia longiflora. The earliest valid publication for Vellozo’s plant was by Bureau and K. Schumann in the Flora Brasiliensis as Tecoma longiflora. Thus Grisebach’s 1866 Tecoma longiflora is the correct basionym for the Antillean species now referred to Ekmanianthe. Unfortunately, Urban (1921), realizing that Tecoma longiflora Bureau & K. Schum. was based on Vellozo’s much older name, decided that that name had precedence over Tecoma longiflora Griseb. and proposed the now widely used, but superfluous, nomen novem Tabebuia grisebachii for the Antillean plant.
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Common Names
Roble real, Roble de Puerto Rico
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Objects
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Distribution
Cuba and Hispaniola, mostly in dry types of forest on flat, well-developed soil. Sea level to 700 m elevation.
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