Cyathea furfuracea Baker

  • Authority

    Proctor, George R. 1989. Ferns of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 53: 1-389.

  • Family

    Cyatheaceae

  • Scientific Name

    Cyathea furfuracea Baker

  • Description

    Species Description - Caudex erect, slender, usually to 4 m tall (rarely more), rough with raised oval scars 1.5-2.5 cm long, or the upper part covered with adherent stipe-bases, the apical bud clothed with bicolorous lanceolate scales mostly 1-1.5 cm long, these brown or golden with pale margins. Fronds arcuate-spreading, 1.2-2 m long; stipes 20-50 cm long, brown, strongly decurved at base, armed with stout flattened-conic spines up to 3,5 mm long, and bearing toward base numerous deciduous, bicolorous, ovate-attenuate scales up to 1.5 cm long. Blades ovate or oblong-ovate, 1-1.5 m long, up to 80 cm broad, 2-pinnate-pinnatifid; rhachis distantly muricate; pinnae 10-15 pairs, sessile to short-stalked, deltate-oblong or lanceoblong, 20-40 cm long, 7-15 cm broad, shortacuminate at apex; costae pale rusty-hairy on adaxial side, scabrous and muriculate beneath and bearing a few nanow brown scales; pinnules 18-23 pairs, oblong to lance-oblong, 3.5-7.5 cm long, 0.9-2 cm broad, sessile, incised nearly to costule, the acuminate-caudate apex crenate-serrate; costules appressed msty-pubemlous on adaxial side, rather densely hairy and scaly beneath, some of the scales ovate, sub-bullate and long-attenuate; similar scales on ultimate midveins abaxially; segments 11-16 pairs, oblong or narrowly oblong, 2.5-4 mm broad, obtuse at apex or else acute and subfalcate, the margins more or less crenate (rarely lobed); veins 6-9 pairs, simple or once-forked, bearing whitish hairs on both sides. Sori 3-5 pairs, inframedial; indusium globose, delicately membranous or hyaline, bursting inegularly; receptacle minutely capitate; paraphyses reddish-brown setiferous.

    Distribution and Ecology - General Distribution. Greater Antilles. Distribution in Puerto Rico. Confined to the highest peaks ofthe Cordillera Central; recorded from Adjuntas and Jayuya. Habitat. Montane dwarf forest at high elevations (1150-1338 m), locally common.

  • Discussion

    Fig. 29.

    Lectotype. Purdie I-B, from Portland Gap, Jamaica (K, isolectotype B M , photo GH).

    Syn. Cyathea muricata of Grisebach, Fl. Brit. W.L 704. 1864, in part, not Willd., 1810.

    Cyathea asperula Maxon, Contr. U.S. Natl. Herb. 17: 179. 1913. (Type. Tuerckheim 3056, from Dominican Republic, US.)