Mimosa albida var. albida

  • Title

    Mimosa albida var. albida

  • Authors

    Rupert C. Barneby

  • Scientific Name

    Mimosa albida Humb. & Bonpl. ex Willd. var. albida

  • Description

    324a. Mimosa albida Humboldt & Bonpland ex Willdenow var. albida. M. albida Willdenow, 1806, l.c., sens. str.—"Habitat in America meridionali.", the locality given by Kunth, Mimoses 2, pl. 1. 1819 & in Humboldt, Bonpland & Kunth, Nov. gen. sp. 6(qu): 249. 1842: "in litore Oceani Pacifici, prope pagum Moche Peruvianorum [near Trujillo, depto. La Libertad, ± 8°S]. "—Holotypus, B-WILLD 19062, seen in microfiche! = F Neg. 1295; isotypi, Humboldt & Bonpland 3756, P-HBK! P (hb. Bonpland.)!

    (?) M. strigosa Willdenow, Sp. pl. 4: 1030. 1806.— "Habitat in America meridionali [the collector not recorded]."—Holotypus, B-WILLD 19065, seen in microfiche, is a flowering specimen not identifiable to variety. The plant described as M. strigosa by Kunth in Nova gen. sp. 6(qu): 248, collected by Humboldt & Bonpland "ad Orenocum" is probably conspecific, but is of controversial provenance (P- HBK!).—M. albida var. strigosa (Willdenow) B. L. Robinson, Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 33: 311. 1898. M. racemosa Schlechtendal, Linnaea 12: 557. 1838.—"[MEXICO] In Pr[ov.] Oajaca leg. Muhlenpfordt. Specimen unicum floriferum.. . .’’—Holotypus not seen, to be sought at HAL.—Equated by Bentham, 1875: 391 with M. floribunda, and by Rudd, 1968:437, with M. albida albida, with which the protologue closely agrees.

    M. floribunda sensu Hooker, Icon. pl. 4: t. 373. 1841 (specimen mexicanum a Galeotti pr. Jalapa lectum); non Willd.

    M. albida var. albida and var. strigosa sensu Rudd, 1968: 437; R. Grether, 1982: 84.

    Within its species distinguished in S. America by the relatively narrow, sessile or subsessile craspedium and in Mexico and Central America by its densely strigose replum and valves; stems unarmed to densely aculeate, and lfts from strigose and puberulent on both faces to strigose beneath and either glabrous or simply puberulent above, rarely glabrescent on both faces.

    Widespread and common over most of tropical and submontane Mexico and Central America, extending n. on the Pacific slope to Sinaloa (± 24°N) and on the Gulf lowlands to Tamaulipas and Yucatan Peninsula; unknown from Panama, Venezuela [except for questionable type-locality of M. strigosa, q.v. supra], or Ecuador, but reappearing on roadsides, in waste places and in disturbed thickets between sea level and 1500(-l 730) m along the Pacific slope of n. and centr. Peru, from Tumbes s. to Lima; remotely disjunct in unrecorded habitats at 700-1500 m in deptos. Yungas and Santa Cruz, Bolivia, and in lowland capoeira on upper rio Madeira in Rondônia, Brazil.—Fl. in S. America I-VIII(-?), perhaps intermittently through the year. Map 51 (showing range in S. America and Panama only).

    The var. albida is adapted to secondary habitats and seeds prolifically. It appears genuinely native in Mexico. Possibly the disjunct South American populations descend from early introductions. Some flowering specimens from northern Peru cannot be distinguished certainly from var. willdenowii, creating doubt about the exact dispersal limits of the two varieties in this region. Of the few known Bolivian records, that from Santa Cruz (R. S. Williams 1449, NY) bears fruit and is unequivocally var. albida; those from Yungas (Bang 1435 and Rusby 1297, both NY), in flower only, may require reevaluation.