Bactris maraja
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Authority
Mori, S. A., et al. 1997. Guide to the vascular plants of central French Guiana: Part 1. Pteridophytes, gymnosperms, and monocotyledons. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 76: 1-422.
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Family
Arecaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Species Description - Medium-sized, multi-stemmed plants of understory, 2-10 m X 2-5 cm, with 2-10 trunks, the internodes 2-25 cm long, armed with clusters of flattened, obliquely retrorse black spines 1-10 cm long. Leaves 5-12, erect and arching; sheath 30-60 cm long; petiole 30-60 cm long, rounded below, flattened above, both greenish-brown lepidote and armed with 0.5-5 cm long, flat, yellowish to brownish spines, darker at base and at tip than in middle; rachis green, 1.2-2 m long, basally armed with scattered flat spines; blade pinnate, with 17-30 pinnae per side, pinnae oblanceolate, sigmoid, longacuminate, 30-75 X 2.5-6 cm, finely tomentose abaxially; oriented in several planes and clearly borne in 4-8, rather widely spaced groups of 2-7; apical pinnae not wider than others. Inflorescences 1 or 2, interfoliar; peduncle 15-40 cm long, yellowish brown, velvety; prophyll glabrous, 12-30 cm long; peduncular bract 30-50 cm long, fusiform and arched, slightly woody, densely covered by a dark-brown, velvety tomentum, sometimes with a few, scattered, flattened, appressed black spines; rachis 3-10 cm long, bearing 8-25 rachillae 10-20 cm long, ± drooping when fruiting. Fruits globose, glabrous, 12-18 mm diam., brownish black at maturity. Fl (Jan, Feb), fr (Mar-Dec); often on waterlogged soils along streams, but sometimes on slopes, in the vicinity of Saul found only on Mont Galbao.
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Distribution
Fl (Jan, Feb), fr (Mar-Dec); often on waterlogged soils along streams, but sometimes on slopes, in the vicinity of Saul found only on Mont Galbao.
French Guiana South America|