Paullinia pinnata L.

• Title

  Paullinia pinnata L.

• Authors

  Nathaniel Lord Britton, Frances W. Horne

• Scientific Name

  Paullinia pinnata L.

• Description

  Flora Borinqueña Paullinia pinnata Bejuco de costilla Paullinia Family Sapindaceae Soapberry Family Paullinia pinnata Linnaeus, Species Plantarum 524. 1753. A high-climbing vine, with once-compound leaves, their stalk and axis curiously winged-margined, and long, slender clusters of small, white flowers, rather common in Porto Rico in thickets and woodlands at lower and middle elevations in moist and dry districts, growing also on Vieques Island. It is distributed westward to Cuba, eastward on the Virgin Islands St. Thomas and Tortola, in the Lesser Antilles from Martinique to Trinidad, widely in continental tropical America, and is recorded as also in tropical Africa. The flower-clusters usually bear 2 tendrils. Only one species of this genus is known to grow in Porto Rico. The Linnaean genus Paullinia commemorates Simon Paulli, professor in Copenhagen, who lived from 1608 to 1680. About 125 species are recognized, natives of tropical America. They are woody vines, with alternate, compound leaves, and small, somewhat irregular flowers in axillary clusters. There are 5, overlapping sepals, and 4 petals, with 2 small scales; the 8 stamens are separate, or united by their filaments at the base; the ovary is 3-celled, the styles sometimes partly united. The capsular fruit is 3-angled, or 3-winged. Paullinia pinnata (pinnate-leaved) may attain a length o f 10 meters, or more, its angular branches hairy when young. The short-stalked leaves are from 8 to 15 centimeters long, the stalk, and the leaf-axis narrowly or broadly winged between the leaflets; there are usually 5, ovate to elliptic, pointed leaflets from 6 to 12 centimeters long, stalkless, coarsely toothed, smooth and shining above, usually hairy on the veins beneath. The flower-clusters are long-stalked, slender, and hairy, the flowers about 5 millimeters broad. The 3-angled, stalked, pear-shaped capsule is from 1.5 to 3 centimeters long.