Acalypha heteromorpha Rusby

  • Authority

    Rusby, Henry H. 1927. Descriptions of New Genera and Species of Plants Collected on the Mulford Biological Exploration of the Amazon Valley 1921-1922. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 7: 205-387.

  • Family

    Euphorbiaceae

  • Scientific Name

    Acalypha heteromorpha Rusby

  • Description

    Species Description - (Pistillate plant.) Petioles, etc., minutely papillose, the upper leaf-surfaces sparsely short-strigose, the lower sparsely puberulent. Stems stout, green, irregularly silicate. Petioles 1.5 to 2 dm. long, strongly silicate. Blades 12 to 18 cm. long, and nearly as broad, ovate with subtruncate or slightly cordate base and a short acutish terminal point, shortly serrate-dentate, with obtuse teeth, very thin, deep-green, all the venation slender, prominent on the lower surface, the secondaries about 12 on each side, including a nerve-like pair from the base, connected by few straightish tertiaries, all branches connecting to form a strong line close to the margin. Spikes slender, subsessile, solitary in the axils, much shorter than the petioles, the pistillate flowers all of one form or of two forms in tho same spike, those with short stigmas at the base. Bracts of the flowers having long stigmas bright-green, thin, semicircular or reniform, 3 mm. broad, flabellately nerved, lacerate-dentate, the teeth ending in a long seta. Ovary small, subglobose, pilose, the stigmas red, more than 1 cm. long, much-divided and pilose. Bracts of the flowers with short stigmas similar but broader. Stigmas similar but small, shorter than the calyx. Staminate plant not seen.