Passiflora pallida L.

• Title

  Passiflora pallida L.

• Authors

  Nathaniel Lord Britton, Frances W. Horne

• Scientific Name

  Passiflora pallida L.

• Description

  Flora Borinqueña Passiflora pallida Small Passion-flower Family Passifloraceae Passion-flower Family Passiflora pallida Linnaeus, Species Plantarum 955.1753. Passiflora minima Linnaeus, Species Plantarum 958. 1753. Passiflora hirsuta Linnaeus, Species Plantarum 958. 1753. Passiflora suberosa Linnaeus, Species Plantarum 958. 1753. Variations in shape and size of leaves, and in degrees of hairyness, of this slender, herbaceous vine, led Linnaeus to describe it as 4 different species, and subsequent authors have added other names to the synonyms; more recent studies have indicated that these are but forms, or races of a single species, ranging throughout tropical America, north to Florida and Bermuda. The vine is common in Porto Rico, on hillsides, banks, woodlands and thickets from sea-level to at least 700 meters elevation in both moist and dry regions, and occurs also on all the small islands Desecheo, Mona, Cayo Muertos, Cayo Icacos, Vieques and Culebra. An account of the genus Passiflora may be found with our description of Passiflora foetida. Passiflora pallida (pale) differs from the other passion-flowers of our Flora in having flowers without petals. It is a smooth, or hairy vine, with narrow, or broad, 5-nerved leaves from 6 to 15 centimeters long, 3-lobed, toothed, or without lobes or teeth, the lobes pointed, narrow or broad, the base narrowed, rounded or heart-shaped, the stalks from 5 to 15 millimeters long, bearing 2 glands at or above the middle. The flower-stalks, longer than the leaf-stalks, are usually in pairs in the axils; the greenish, lance-shaped sepals are from 8 to 12 millimeters long; the processes of the corona, shorter than the sepals, are purple at the base. The oval, or nearly globular berry is 10 or 12 millimeters in diameter.