Balizia pedicellaris

  • Title

    Balizia pedicellaris

  • Authors

    Rupert C. Barneby

  • Scientific Name

    Balizia pedicellaris (DC.) Barneby & J.W.Grimes

  • Description

    2. Balizia pedicellaris (de Candolle) Barneby & Grimes, comb. nov. Inga pedicellaris de Candolle, Prodr. 2: 441. 1825. — " ... in Cayenna.," the collector not given. — Holotypus, G-DC! = F Neg. 6972. — Pithecolobium pedicellare (de Candolle) Bentham in Hooker, London J. Bot. 3: 219. 1844. Feuilleea pedicellaris (de Candolle) O. Kuntze, Revis. Gen. Pl. 1: 188. 1891. Samanea pedicellaris (de Candolle) Killip ex Record, Trop. Woods 63: 4. 1940 (Sept). Macrosamanea (?) pedicellaris (de Candolle) Kleinhoonte in Pulle, Fl. Suriname 2(2): 329. 1940 (Dec).

    Mimosa terminalis Vellozo., Fl. Flumin 11: t. 30. 1829 & Arq. Mus. Nac. Rio de Janeiro 5: 437. 1881. — "Habitat silvis maritimis." — Holotypus, the cited plate (the terminal pinna, however, anomalous)!.

    Pithecolobium pedicellare sensu Bentham, 1875: 588; 1876: 442; Ducke, 1949: 39; Lindeman & Mennega, Bomenboek Surinam 191. 1963.

    Macrosamanea pedicellaris sensu Nielsen, 1981: 181, fig. 1(4); Lewis, Leg. Bahia 165, fig. 11 (O-R), pl. 9(F). 1987.

    Microphyllidious trees attaining 40 m in height with trunk to 1 m diam dbh but often fertile as slender treelets as little as 3 m tall, the foliage crowded toward the end of hornotinous branchlets, these like all axes of lvs and inflorescence sordid-pilosulous or -strigulose with ascending-incurved or appressed hairs to 0.1-0.3 mm, the foliage bicolored, the firm, marginally revolute lfts on upper face convex but depressed along midrib, rich green, glabrous and often lustrous, beneath pale brown dull, thinly pilosulous and densely pallid-papillate (the papillae forming a rosette at base of each hair), the umbelliform racemes of small reddish, white-stamened fls single or 2-3 together in the axil of coeval lvs and immersed in foliage, the apical meristem of each branch indeterminate. Stipules caducous from the expanding lf and therefore present only about the young shoot-apex, linear-lanceolate or ligulate, (2-)2.5-8 x (0.3-)0.5-1.3 mm, puberulent like the stem, externally nerveless. Lf-formula vi-x(-xiv)/(-16)18- 29(-33), locally in upland Bahia xi-xvii/22-31; lf-stk  of major lvs 7-18(-25) cm, the petiole 2-4.2(-5) cm, the longer interpinnal segments (7—)9—17(—21) mm, the ventral sulcus continuous except where interrupted by a nectary; petiolar nectaries variable in number, position, and form: almost always one near midpetiole, often a second between first and others between 1-2 furthest pairs of pinnae, exceptionally one between first pair only (inland Bahia), the proximal ones either sessile or very shortly stipitate and pileiform, convex or less often plane, in profile 0.5-1.2(-l.7) mm tall and 1.3-2.7 mm diam, and nearly always small goblet-shaped nectaries on pinnae at furthest 1-8 pairs of lfts; pinnae proximally decrescent, beyond midrachis subequilong, the rachis of distal ones (4-)5-9(-10) cm, the longer interfoliolar segments 2-4 mm; pulvinules 0.3-0.7 mm; lfts strongly decrescent proximally, less so distally, the first pair often represented by minute paraphyllidia, the blades narrowly oblong, narrowly lance-oblong, or oblong-elliptic from inequilateral (postically obtuse, antically angulate) base, broadly obtuse, those near midrachis 6—13.5(—16) x 1.8-3.3(-4) mm, (3-)3.2—4.2(-5) times as long as wide; venation of subcentric, dorsally cariniform midrib, this commonly simple at maturity of blade but when young, rarely later, pinnately branched, the secondary venules ±7- 12 on each side, ascending at wide angles and expiring just short of revolute margin. Peduncles (2.5-)3- 6.5(-8) cm, becoming stout and persistent into a second year; capitula ±(15-)20-40-fld, the receptacle 2-4.5 mm, the 5-, randomly 6-merous fls dimorphic, the peripheral ones slenderly pedicellate, one or commonly 2-3 distal ones (sub)sessile, longer, and with exserted androecial tube; bracts minute, caducous long before anthesis; perianth pubescent externally, the calyx sordid-puberulent overall, the corolla silky dorsally, the lobes white-ciliolate; PERIPHERAL FLS: lower pedicels (4-)4.5-7.5 mm; calyx campanulate or turbinate-campanulate (2-)2.3-3 x 1.3-1.8 (-2) mm, the deltate-triangular teeth 0.3-0.8(-l) mm; corolla 5.3-7.4 mm, the lobes (1.3-)1.5-2.3(-2.5) mm; androecium 12-22(-28)-merous, 17-26(-36) mm long, the stemonozone ±1 mm, the tube (1.5-) 2.3-3.7 mm; ovary truncate, puberulent at and near apex, proximally glabrous or almost so; TERMINAL FL(S): calyx plumply campanulate from turbinate base (3-)3.4-4.6 x 2-2.8 mm; corolla (6.5)7-11 mm; androecial tube 7—12(—16) mm, as long as corolla or up to 2 mm longer. Pods 1-3 per capitulum, stiffly spreading-ascending from receptacle, sessile at oblique base, in profile oblong or broad-linear, straight or almost so, abruptly contracted at apex into a linear-subulate (deciduous) beak to 1 cm, the whole 7—12.5(—14) x (1.7-)1.8-3.2 cm, (12-)14-20- ovulate, the lignescent, never pulpy (but sometimes resinous) valves at first plane and dark reddish brown, becoming blackish brown and either low-convex or prominently umbonate over each seed, framed by almost straight, plane woody sutures 2.5-4 mm wide, the ripe valves consisting of: (a) thin blackish exocarp breaking into small tetragonal tesserae; (b) a midlayer of coarse transverse, parallel, and subcontiguous woody fibers; and (c) a crustaceous endocarp coherent between seeds but not septiferous; dehiscence follicular, through the seminiferous suture, the valves gaping to release the seeds but the pod often deciduous before this occurs, the valves also splitting transversely between seeds into linear-oblong panels 4-7(-8) mm wide, but these remaining permanently attached to the sutures; seeds transverse near middle of pod on slender tapelike sigmoid funicle, exactly basifixed, in broad outline narrowly oblong or oblong-elliptic (6-)7.5-9 x 3-4 mm, compressed but plump, either putty-colored overall or colored brown or green within the narrowly U-shaped pleurogram, the hard testa ±0.2-0.3 mm thick.

    In non-inundated primary rain forest, mostly below 200 m but ascending on the sources of the Amazon between Ecuador and Bolivia to ±700-775 m, and southeasterly in lowland Atlantic forest and (locally in Bahia) in gallery forest near 800 m, discontinuously widespread in South America: relatively frequent from E Venezuela (Sucre, Bolívar, Delta-Amacuro) SE through the Guianas and lower Amazonian Brazil to Maranhão, thence sporadically W through the Amazon basin to SE Ecuador, SE Colombia (Vaupés), centr. Peru (Huánuco), and Bolivia (Nor-Yungas, Cochabamba); disjunct along the SE Brazilian coast between 13° and 24°30'S in Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, and São Paulo; represented in upland Bahia on the headwaters of Río Paraguaçú (near 12°30'S) by an aberrant form (see discussion following). — Map 5. —Fl. in equatorial latitudes ill-defined, apparently at intervals throughout the year, in SE Brazil XI—II. — Samiknum, zamitmi (Ecuador); vilco Colorado (Peru); arraigan, bayan (Bolivia); hueso de pescado amarillo, hueso de pescado Colorado, kairemap-yek, samán montanero (Venezuela); (red) manaliballi, manari- balli (Guyana, Surinam); aprobigi, tamarenprokoni, tamarinde plokonie (Surinam); assao, bois la morue, bois macaque (French Guiana); kalaipe (Wayampi of French Guiana); esponja, esponjeira, faveira (Amazonian Brazil); arapucumira (Ka’apor of Maranhão); juruena branca (Bahia).

    Populations of B. pedicellaris on the eastern slope of Chapada Diamantina in Bahia were mentioned by Lewis (1987: 165) as distinguished from the typical form of lowland Atlantic forest by more numerous petiolar nectaries and different indumentum of leaflets. These plants are indeed aberrant in position of nectaries and in very short true petiole of the leaves. It is as though a supernumerary pair of short pinnae were inserted at the lowest nectary, which elsewhere is situated well below the first pinna-pair. In context of the whole species, the indumentum is not really characteristic.

    The specimens from prae-Andean Amazonia are indistinguishable morphologically from those of lower Amazonia and the Guianas.

    We have no solution to the mystery surrounding Mimosa chrysantha Vahl (Eclog. Amer. 2: 38. 1798), which Bentham (1875: 588) attributed with reservations to Pithecolobium pedicellare. The holotypus, collected at Cayenne by von Rohr, was seen by Bentham in Vahl’s herbarium, but can no longer be located there (Mrs. Fox Maule, in litt.!). The leaf-formula given in the protologue is compatible with B. pedicellaris, but the abscence of petiolar nectary and yellow color of the corolla are not. De Candolle (Prodr. 2: 471), who knew it only from description,  hesitantly referred M. chrysantha to Acacia. The only bipinnate species of Ingeae with yellow flowers likely to have been found in French Guiana is Zygia (Marmaroxylon) racemosa, but this has nectaries that could hardly have been overlooked.