Gaultheria gracilis Small

Description

Description: Terrestrial or sometimes epiphytic shrub, 0.4-2 m tall; mature stems terete, striate, glabrous; bark fissured, cracking into longitudinal strips, brown, grayish, or blackish; twigs terete, glabrous to puberulent, and also moderately to densely appressed-strigose with rigid, straight, basally swollen, tan to hyaline, eglandular hairs to 2.5 mm long (hirsute with stramineous to dark brown hairs 1-4(-5) mm long, or glabrate and then appearing reddish punctate from remaining swollen bases of hairs); buds ovate, scales striate, glabrous or puberulent but ciliate, light brown. Leaves coriaceous, surface flat (+ bullate), elliptic to ovate-elliptic, (3-)4-6(-8.5) x (1-)1.5-2.5(-3.5) cm, base acute, or cuneate to obtuse (rounded), apex long-acuminate to acute, margin minutely and inconspicuously serrulate with each tooth terminating in an appressed bristle 1-2.2 mm long, sparsely to densely appressed strigose above with deciduous, basally swollen hairs to 2 mm long, conspicuously and usually densely appressed strigose beneath with stramineous to ferruginous hairs to 3 mm long; midrib impressed above and raised beneath, lateral nerves (2-3 per side) impressed to slightly raised above and conspicuously raised beneath, reticulate veinlets moderately raised on both surfaces; petiole subterete, flattened and sometimes strongly canaliculate above, appearing papillate from swollen bases of deciduous hairs, 4-7 mm long, short-puberulent or glabrate and often also strigose with hairs to 2.5 mm long. Inflorescence racemose, 6-9(-14)-flowered; rachis subterete, often ridged, (2-)3-7(-8) cm long, moderately to densely short-pilose with white hairs (also bearing few, spreading, minutely gland-tipped hairs to 4 mm long, or densely strigose with eglandular hairs); pedicels terete, striate, 5-10(-12) mm long, moderately to densely short-pilose (densely strigose); bracteoles continuous with and borne along middle half of pedicel, strongly divergent, papyraceous, linear to narrowly oblong, 2-4.5 x 0.5-1 mm, ciliolate and sometimes densely short-pilose at tip (strigose); floral bract persistent, continuous with pedicel (not rachis), membranous to chartaceous, conspicuously striate, cucullate, strongly divergent from the pedicel, broadly elliptic to spatulate, 3-10(-14) x 2-6 mm, ciliate (glandular-fimbriate distally), puberulous or glabrous on both surfaces (also densely strigose on outer surface). Flowers with calyx glabrous (or densely strigose-villous), 3.5-5 mm long, lobes ovate to deltoid, 2-3 x 1.8-2.5 mm, acute to acuminate, ciliate, short-pilose within; corolla urceolate to cylindric-urceolate, terete, 4-8 x 3-4 mm, glabrous or moderately to densely strigose (densely strigose-villous with stramineous to golden-tawny, eglandular or minutely gland-tipped hairs 0.2-0.6 mm long), puberulent within, greenish or white to rose when fresh, lobes oblong to triangular, 1-1.5 mm long; stamens 2.3-3 mm long; filaments 1.5-2.2 mm long, glabrous or weakly pilose; anthers 1-1.3 mm long, awns prominent; ovary glabrous or weakly short-pilose; style 2.5-4 mm long, glabrous. Fruiting calyx to 9 mm diam., glabrous, blue-black.

Distribution: Endemic to Costa Rica and adjacent western Panama where it is found in cloud and elfin forests, high-elevation bogs, disturbed forest, and remnant trees in pasturelands at elevations of (1100-)1400-2700(-3140) m. Flowering and fruiting occur throughout the year.

Type: Costa Rica. San José: La Palma, 1550 m, Aug 1898 (fl, early fr), Tonduz 7463 (holotype, US, photo Corcoran neg. 38; isotype, M).

Illustrated: Wilbur & Luteyn, Fl. Panama, Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 65: 86. 1978.

Cultivated: E.

Floras and Monographs

Gaultheria gracilis Small: [Article] Luteyn, James L., et al. 1995. Ericaceae, Part II. The Superior-Ovaried Genera (Monotropoideae, Pyroloideae, Rhododendroideae, and Vaccinioideae P.P.). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 66: 560.

Map Distribution

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