Myrcia clusiifolia (Kunth) DC.
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Authority
Maguire, Bassett. 1969. The botany of the Guayana Highland-part VIII. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 18: 1-290.
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Family
Myrtaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Species Description - A shrub or small tree 4 m high or less, sometimes nearly or wholly glabrous in age, the young herbage and inflorescence rather thinly pubescent with pale stiff ascending hairs; leaves soon glabrate, obovate or broadly elliptic, occasionally ovate, 4-8 cm long, 2-4.5 cm wide, 1.5-2.3 times as long as wide, rounded or obtusely pointed at apex, sometimes abruptly rounded to base but usually rounded-cuneate, the margins decurrent on the inner angles of the petioles 5(-8) mm long; midvein concave above, and somewhat depressed in a shallow trough; lateral veins indefinite in number, ca 10-15 including some intermediate ones, straight, evident on both surfaces, more prominent beneath; marginal vein about as strong as the lateral ones, and scarcely arched between them, 1(-2) mm from the margin; small veinlets forming a conspicuous reticulum on both surfaces, especially the lower; upper surface lustrous, the lower often gland-dotted and drying pale rusty-brown; inflorescence an axillary panicle, 3(-4)-times compound, with up to 30 flowers or more, 5-10 cm long, the flowers mostly in 3's near the tips, the terminal flower in each cluster sessile; bracts linear-lanceolate, 1.5-3.5 mm long, deciduous before anthesis; buds broadly pyriform, 3-3.5 mm long; hypanthium densely pale-strigose, ridged in drying, 1.3 mm long; calyx-lobes 5, sparingly pubescent outside and densely so within, broadly rounded, 1.3-1.5 mm long, up to 2.5 mm wide, in bud rounded on the backs, imbricate much exceeded by the globe of the petals; disk 2.5-3 mm wide, concave; style 5 mm long; petals white, broadly rounded, pubescent on the outer surface; stamens about 100; fruit purple-black, suborbicular, 5-8 mm in diam; embryo myrcioid; ovary bilocular, with two ascending ovules in each locule.
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Discussion
Myrtus clusiaefolia H.B.K., Nov. Gen. & Sp. 6: 138 [folio ed. 110]. 1823.
This species seems never before to have been relocated since the original collections by Humboldt and Bonpland; the type-locality is unknown ["in America meridionah"], but it now seems safe to assume that the plant was collected somewhere on the upper Orinoco or the Rio Negro. The type (see Field Mus. neg. 36881), which I have studied in Paris, seems surely to represent the same species as the other specimens cited below. It is a mature fruiting specimen from which almost all vestiges of the pubescence have been eroded, but in other respects it is a good match for e.g., the collections by Wurdack and Adderley from the upper Orinoco
Distribution and Ecology: BRAZIL. Amazonas:Rio Araca, sub-afl. do Rio Negro, 25 Oct 1952 (bud), Froes & Addison 29123 (MICH), 4 Nov 1952 (fl), Froes & Addison 29272 (MICH). VENEZUELA. Amazonas: Rio Siapa, Casiquiare, elev 100-130 m, 9 Feb 1954 (fr), Maguire et al 37669 ( M I C H ) ; Cerro Yapacana, savanna no. 1 at base of mountain, elev 150 m, 31 Dec 1950 (fl), Maguire et al 30513 ( M I C H ) ; Rio Ventuari, Sabana de Moyo, elev 150 m, 5 M a y 1954 (fl), Silverio Level 35 ( M I C H ) ; Rio Orinoco, vicinity of Rio Atabapo, elev 125 m, 30 M a y 1959 (fr), Wurdack & Adderley 42691 (MICH), 3 Jun 1959 (fr), Wurdack & Adderley 42754 (MICH).
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Distribution
Brazil South America| Amazonas Brazil South America| Venezuela South America|