Pereskia portulacifolia (L.) DC.

Authority

Leuenberger, Beat E. 1986. Pereskia (Cactaceae). Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 41: 1-140.

Family

Cactaceae

Scientific Name

Pereskia portulacifolia (L.) DC.

Description

Species Description - Small tree 3-5(-10) m tall, sometimes branching from near the base, shrubby; main branches suberect to arching; trunk to 15-20 cm in diam.; bark gray, nearly smooth but interrupted by the often prominent areoles; twigs 2-3(-4) mm thick, brown, reddish or gray, dark green before periderm formation, older twigs and branches often with knob-like spur shoots to 5-10(-15) mm length and 2-2.5 mm in diam.; internodes 5-15 mm long; pith of main shoots ca. 4 mm in diam., septate. Roots with fusiform thickenings. Areoles rounded to transverse-elliptic, 1-2 mm in diam. on twigs, accrescent on branches, to 5 mm long, 7-9 mm broad and 5 mm high on trunk; tomentum of areoles short, gray, trichomes ca. 0.5 mm long, brown at base; areoles producing spines and 1 -2(-3) brachyblast leaves, often elongating into spur shoots but then normally spineless or older spines deciduous. Leaves variable in shape and size; auxoblast and brachyblast leaves not differing on distal twigs, obovate-spathulate to cordiform, 5-15(-30) x 4-10(-12) mm; auxoblast leaves of main shoots larger, spathulate, 20-35 x 8-15 mm; petiole obscure, 0-1 mm long, blade fleshy, ca. 0.6 mm thick, base attenuate to cuneate, apex broadly acute to rounded, truncate or emarginate, usually acute on long shoots; venation pinnate; midrib prominent below, lateral veins obscure, 0-2(-3), ascending. Spines 0-3 on twigs, (5-) 10-16 mm long and 0.3-0.4 mm thick, stiff, spreading, reddish-brown to black, with conspicuous conical thickening to 1 mm in diam. at base; spines increasing in number to about 50 on old areoles of trunk, 10-22 mm long and 0.5-0.6 mm thick, black, base to 1.5 mm in diam. Flowers imperfectly unisexual (plants functionally dioecious), terminal or on spur shoots, or in subterminal groups, one flower from each of the approximated areoles; 30-55 mm in diam., corolla in bud spherical; pedicels 2-3 mm long. Staminate flowers with turbinate receptacle of 6-8 mm diam., smooth, green; lower bracts 2-3, leaf-like, obovate-spathulate, attenuate at base, 4-9 x 2-7 mm; upper bracts 0-2, spreading, obovate to spathulate, 4-7 x 2-5 mm; sepaloids 35, appressed in bud, obovate to suborbicular with broad base and rounded apex, 8-12 x 4-9 mm; petaloids 8-9, spreading, obovate 15-25 x 7-15 mm, bright pink to purplish-rose; base cuneate to attenuate, apex rounded to slightly emarginate or nearly erose; stamens ca. 200, 5-8 mm long, distinctly longer than the style and completely masking it; filaments pink; anthers 0.8-1.2 mm x 0.6-1.0 mm, pink; pollen 12-colpate, medium-sized, tectum perforate and with large spinules; ovary inferior, but with horizontal, free, ovary roof abruptly narrowed into the style; locule with concave floor, ca. 1 mm in diam., with parietal placentae but no ovules; style reduced, 2-3.5 mm long and 0.5-1 mm thick, narrowed towards the tip and ending in ca. five erect, subulate stigma lobes ca. 0.5 mm long, without papillae. Pistillate flowers similar to the staminate except in the shape of the receptacle and characters of the androecium and gynoecium; receptacle ca. 10 mm in diam., cup-shaped, subglobular; stamens dwarfed, ca. 2-3 mm long, sterile, arising from the low rim of the receptacle surrounding the flat ovary roof; locule ca. 5 mm in diam., spherical, with conspicuous septal ridges at the roof and numerous ovules on long U-shaped placentae in parietal position; ovules ca. 0.8 mm long, with funicles to 1 mm long; style ca. 1 mm long and in diam., grooved; stigma lobes ca. 10, to 7 mm long and 1 mm broad, suberect to spreading. Floral parts above the ovary roof deciduous in early postfloral stage, exposing the umbilicus in young fruits. Fruit subglobular to broadly ficiform, 18-30 mm in diam., pedicel ca. 2 mm long and thick (when fresh); fruit smooth to rough leathery when dry; areoles inconspicuous, bracts 0-2, persistent or deciduous, broadly obovate, ca. 4-5 x 5 mm; umbilicus depressed, flat, circular (often rounded triangular when dried), ca. 6-11 mm in diam., formed by the accrescent ovary roof, fruit wall ca. 2 mm thick; locule filled by the seeds and pulp formed by juicy gelatinous funicles. Seeds numerous, obovate to reniform, ca. 3-3.5 mm long, 2.5-1.2 mm broad and 1.2 mm thick, with low peripheral ribs, smooth on the sides, black, glossy.

Discussion

Cactus portulacifolius Linnaeus, Sp. pl. 469. 1753. Type. “Opuntia arbor, spinosissima, foliis Portulacae cordatis Plum. cat. p. 6. Specimen apparently lost. Linnaeus (Spec. pl. ed. 2, 671. 1762) refers to the illustration in Plumier, Pl. amer. fasc. (ed. Burmann, 1758) pl. 197, fig. 1, drawn from Plumier’s collection, herewith designated as lectotype. According to Plunder's manuscript “Botanicum americanum .. .” (cf. Hunt, 1984), the plant was collected by Plumier himself in St. Domingue (Haiti), Fond Parisien, towards the Grand Cul-de-Sac. Rhodocactus portulacifolius (Linnaeus) F. Knuth in Backeberg & Knuth, Kaktus-ABC 96. 1935. This species has imperfectly unisexual flowers occurring on separate plants, as only recently documented by the collections Zanoni et al. 35204 ([female]) and 35205 ([male]), following earlier unconfirmed observations by the author. Since the plate for P. portulacifolia (Fig. 37) was already finished, a separate illustration of the pistillate flowers is given in Figure 14G, H. Lamarck (1785) noted sterile and fertile flowers, based on a manuscript of Plumier’s, and Plumier’s plate 197, figure 1 (Plumier, 1758), reproduced in Britton and Rose (1919, p. 23, fig. 20), shows one staminate flower between two pistillate flowers with long, spreading stigma lobes. This feature has been overlooked by subsequent authors and collectors. In one specimen with flower and fruit (Clover 1130), I found the only flower to have sterile anthers of normal size and inconspicuous stigma lobes without papillae. The numerous flower buds which I collected at the beginning of the flowering season at two different sites in the Lago Enriquillo valley in the Dominican Republic (Leuenberger 3046 & 3048) are all staminate, but fruits were later collected from trees in the same region (Czerwenka s.n.). Local name. Camelia roja (Liogier, 1974, p. 226). This species was discovered by Plumier between 1689 and 1695 and listed as Opuntia arborescens spinosissima foliis portulacae cordatis in his manuscript “Botanicum americanum. . .” (Hunt, 1984) but not included in his new genus Pereskia (Plumier, 1703). The original material seems to be lost, but a plate drawn from it apparently still exists at Paris (Hunt, 1984). There are also copies (tracings) of the original plate at the University Library at Groningen and at Kew besides the printed version by Burmann (Plumier, 1758), which is chosen as lectotype for the direct reference given to it by Linnaeus (1762). The copies at Groningen were annotated by W. T. Steam (T. P. Hidma, pers. comm.), who identified one on thin paper as a tracing of the original drawing by Claude Aubriet made under the supervision of S. Vaillant at Paris from Plumier’s drawing done in the West Indies. The engraving on thicker paper with several plants on one plate is identified as a “proof before lettering and numbering of J. Burmann’s Plant. Amer. . . The first author to recognize this plant as a species of Pereskia was Haworth (1812, p. 199). However, he did not make the formal combination but mentioned it only as “OBS. Cactus portulaccaefolius is another species of this Genus,” noting that it had not yet been introduced into English gardens. The species was not collected again until 1900 and to my knowledge it had not been introduced into cultivation outside Hispaniola until 1985. Pereskia portulacifolia is closely related to P. zinniiflora, and together with P. quisqueyana, it belongs to a group of endemic Caribbean species of common ancestry. Some specimens of P. zinniiflora seem to approach this species in leaf shape, and a rather narrow species concept must be applied in this case to avoid bulky trinomials.

Distribution

Distribution (Fig. 36) and phenology. Endemic to Hispaniola; arid regions of Haiti and adjacent areas in the southwestern Dominican Republic, in the lowland, in dry forests and thorn scrub with Acacia, Stenocereus, Neoabbottia, and Opuntia; common in Haiti; main flowering period from March to August, fruits collected in May and August.

West Indies| Haiti South America| Dominican Republic South America|