Tabebuia brooksiana Britton
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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. Oriente (Granma): Ensenada de Mora, Britton, Cowell & Shafer 12985 (holotype, NY; isotype, MO).
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Synonyms
Tabebuia nigripes Urb.
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Description
Species Description - Tree ca. 10 m tall, dichotomously branched, the branchlets terete, lepidote with small sessile whitish scales, sometimes also with scattered larger reddish scales or sparsely puberulous with inconspicuous minute simple trichomes. Leaves 5-7-foliolate, the leaflets narrowly oblong-elliptic, the apex rounded or minutely retuse (obtuse to acutish with a minute apiculation in Morton 9674), the base cuneate to rounded, the terminal 5.5-16 cm long, 1.5-5 cm wide (2.1-3.7 times as long as wide), the basals 2.5-8.7 cm long, 1.2-4 cm wide, chartaceous to thin-coriaceous, lepidote above and below, sometimes also minutely inconspicuously puberulous along midvein below, the secondary veins prominulous below, plane or slightly impressed above, more or less brochidodromous, drying dark olive above, olive to brownish-olive below, the margin slightly erose, occasionally with a few large plate-shaped glands near base of midvein below, the terminal petiolule 1-3.8 cm long, the basal petiolules well-developed, (0.2-)0.5-1 cm long, the petiole 5-13 cm long, petiole and petiolule lepidote, usually also with a few minute inconspicuous simple trichomes, often with longer trichomes at apex of petiole. Inflorescence a dichotomously branched terminal panicle, densely lepidote with dark-drying or reddish scales. Flowers with the calyx cupular, irregularly 2-3-labiate, 10-15 mm long, 5-7 mm wide, densely lepidote with darkdrying sessile peltate scales; corolla pink or light pink, tubular-infundibuliform 4-5 cm long, 1-1.5 cm wide at mouth of tube, the tube 2.5-3.5 cm long, the lobes ca. 1.5 cm long, tube glabrous outside, scurfy puberulous in throat inside, villous at level of stamen insertion, the lobes more or less ciliate, sparsely scurfy puberulous inside and outside along veins, anthers included in lower half of tube, the thecae divaricate, 2-3 mm long; ovary linear, the surface unridged, densely glandular-lepidote with darkish scales, 6 mm long, 1.5-2 mm wide; disk annular-pulvinate, 1 mm long, 3 mm wide. Fruit a capsule, not seen.
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Discussion
Very close to and somewhat intermediate between T. angustata and T. leptoneura. From the former, of which it may be no more than a local variant, it is distinguished mostly by the rounded or retuse leaflet tips, from the latter by the mostly 7-foliolate leaves, erose leaflet margins, lack of prominent gland fields at base of midvein below, and generally thinner texture. The sterile type of T. nigripes has slightly larger leaflets more densely lepidote below and with the midvein below more obviously puberulous but is surely not specifically distinct; this specimen approaches T. pulverulenta and it is possible that that species and T. brooksiana hybridize. In general, density of leaf scales is too variable to be of much taxonomic significance. Thus the density of scales proposed in the Flora de Cuba as the key criterion for distinguishing T. brooksiana (as well as T. trinitatis) from T. angustata does not vary in parallel with the leaf shape and texture differences emphasized herein as specific distinguishing characters.
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Common Names
roble, roble de yugo
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Objects
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Distribution
Eastern Cuba in Camagüey, Granma, Guantánamo, and Santiago de Cuba Provinces, 0-400 m alt. Savannas and woodlands.
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