Alibertia tutumilla 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

    Rubiaceae

  • Scientific Name

    Alibertia tutumilla Rusby

  • Description

    Species Description - Glabrous, excepting the flowers. Branchlets short, rather stout, reddish-brown, roughened with leaf scars, very leafy. Stipules nearly 1 cm. long, connate at the base, thin, brown, caducous, leaving a very shortly setose base surrounding the stem. Petioles nearly 2 cm. long, reddish, like the midrib, rigid, strongly channeled above. Blades to 2 dm. long, and 8 cm. broad, lance-oblong, the base tapering into the petiole, acuminate and acute at the summit, entire, thickish and rigid, deep-green, somewhat shining, the slender venation prominent beneath, the secondaries about 12 to 14 pairs, the lower opposite, more or less decurrent on the midrib, widely spreading, the outer portions strongly curved. Flower terminal, subsessile, solitary, subtended by 2 or more broadly ovate bracts resembling the stipules. Calyx-tube 7 mm. long, 5 or 6 mm. broad, obovoid, somewhat constricted at the summit, the limb about as long and broad, the base slightly dilated, darker than the upper cylindric portion, which is finely many-nerved, truncate, with six extremely short lobes. Corolla minutely gray-downy on both surfaces, the tube 1 cm. long, stout, enlarged above, the lobes 1 cm. long, ovate, acutish, thick. Fruit nearly spheric, 4 cm. broad, on a stipe 5 mm. long and 1 cm. broad, dark-brown, glabrous, bearing the persistent calyx-tube, about 5 mm. long and broad, with a thick epigynous disk at its base. Pericarp crustaceous. Seeds imbedded in a pulp of peculiar, sweet and slightly acid agreeable flavor, the seeds lenticular, slightly obovoid, 7 mm. long, light brown.

  • Discussion

    No. 2344, from the same locality, is the same in young fruit, which is called "Tutumilla" and is chocolate-colored when ripe. The young fruit is minutely muricate or granular.

    CHOMELIA BREVICORNU Rusby, Bull. Torrey Club 52: 140. 1925. (No. 1282.)

    CHOMELIA MULTIFLORA Rusby, Bull. Torrey Club 52: 141. 1925. (No. 1365.)

  • Distribution

    Rurrenabaque, 1,000 feet, 0. E. White, January 27, 1922 (no. 2354). "A tree 30 to 40 feet high, in wet forest, and cultivated. Flowers bright creamy-white. Fruit much eaten by the natives, and tastes like axle-grease."

    Bolivia South America|