Chamaefistula antillana Britton & Rose

• Title

  Chamaefistula antillana Britton & Rose

• Authors

  Nathaniel Lord Britton, Frances W. Horne

• Scientific Name

  Chamaefistula antillana Britton & Rose

• Description

  Flora Borinqueña Chamaefistula antillana Hediondilla Family Caesalpiniaceae Senna Family Chamaefistula antillana Britton & Rose; Britton & Wilson, Scientific Survey of Porto Rico & the Virgin Islands 5: 369. 1924. The large, yellow flowers of this vine-like shrub are conspicuous during its blooming periods, mostly in summer and autumn. The plant is native in Porto Rico and in the Virgin Islands Saint Thomas and Tortola, but nowhere else, as far as known; it has several relatives, however, in other West Indian Islands, one of them found in the Luquillo Mountains, and many more exist in continental tropical America, the total number of species of Chamaefistula known to botanists being about 35. The leaves of all the kinds are composed of 2 pairs of broad leaflets, and a small, slender gland is borne between both pairs, or between the lower pair only; the flowers are yellow, the long slender pods round in cross-section, glutinous within, and split when ripe along one side only. The generic name Chamaefistula, published by the British botanist Don in 1832, is Greek, signifying low Fistula, to distinguish these plants from the trees of the genus Cassia, such as Cassia Fistula, the pods of which are woody, long-cylindric, and do not split open, and their flowers have 10 perfect stamens; the flowers of the Chamaefistulas have mostly 7 perfect stamens and 3 imperfect ones (staminodes). The specific name antillana indicates that it is a plant of the West Indies (Antilles). We have learned of no English name for this species; the Spanish name Hedionilla is a diminutive of Hediona, applied to related plants. In Porto Rico it inhabits thickets and woodlands at lower and middle elevations in moist or wet districts. Chamaefistula antillana may attain a length of about 8 meters, but is usually shorter; its angular branches and its leaves are smooth, or finely hairy. The leaves are stalked, and the 2 pairs of leaflets rather distant from each other;