Pentagonia tinajita Seem.

  • Family

    Rubiaceae (Magnoliophyta)

  • Scientific Name

    Pentagonia tinajita Seem.

  • Primary Citation

    Bot. Voy. Herald 134, t. 28. 1854

  • Description

    Author: Xavier Cornejo

    Description: Treelet, unbranched, 1 to 3(-4) m tall. Stipules light green, lanceolate, 3-6 x 1.2-2 cm, papyraceous to chartaceous, abaxially appressed-pilose, mainly along the midrib. Leaves decussate, arranged toward the apex of the stem; terminal leaves sessile or with short petioles to 1.5 cm, the lower leaves subsessile or with petioles to 6 cm long; juvenile individuals often with a mixture of entire and pinnatifid blades, mature individual with blades deeply pinnatifid, 30-80 x 22-40 cm, 3 to 4 lobes on each side, the entire blade papyraceous to chartaceous, adaxially with very short hairs and glabrescent, abaxially with costa and longer secondary veins prominent and tomentulose, the lamina with inconspicuous minor venation and often pilose, the base long attenuate and sometimes subcordate. Inflorescences axillary, subsessile, fasciculate; floral bracts absent or if present, then ovate to lanceolate, ca. 5-12 x 3-4 mm, usually greenish. Flowers: calyx 5-lobed, greenish, sometimes tinged reddish at the apex, the tube 10-15 mm long, the lobes ± oblong, 5-12 x 3-5 mm, erect to reflexed, apex rounded, glabrous; corolla funnelform, fibrous, the tube 20-35 mm long x 8-15 mm diam. (at the apex), white, greenish or yellow, glabrous, the lobes 5, deltoid, 6-8 mm long, apex tomentulose without; stamens 5, included, the filaments attached at lower third of tube; style included. Infructescences sessile. Fruits partially 2-locular, 1.5-3 x 1.5-2.5 cm, at maturity globose or obovoid, orange or red, the mesocarp yellow, the pulp white, soft, juicy, pendulous (with the seeds) from the apical septum; calyx tube ca. 5-8 mm long, the calyx lobes ca. 4-7 mm long. Seeds irregularly shaped, the testa dark brown.

    Common names: Tinajita (Spanish, Seemann, 1854). This is a diminutive of tinajas (Spanish), that means little jar, and refers to the fruit appareance, resembling in shape to the water-jars commonly used in the Province of Veraguas (Panama) (Seemann, 1854).

    Distribution: Costa Rica and Panama. It is found from sea level to 750 m.

    Ecology: In moist and wet forests. This species is persistent in disturbed habitats.

    Phenology: P. tinajita has been collected with flowers throughout the year, and with fruits from Dec to Jul.

    Pollination: Not recorded, but the flowers of this species are pressumably pollinated by hummingbirds.

    Dispersal: Fruits predated and the seeds pressumably dispersed by birds.

    Taxonomic notes: In the original publication (Seemann, 1854), Pentagonia tinajita is described as having red corollas, but none of the ca. 20 collections with flowers of this species studied in herbarium material have red corollas, this has also been confirmed by the two weeks of field observation of P. tinajita in the Peninsula de Osa. Whether if this is a case of variability of the color of corolla in P. tinajita is still an unanswered question. It is needed more field work in the forests of Panama, where other populations of this species also occur. P. tinajita has been reported from NW Ecuador (Andersson & Rova, 2004), but the Ecuadorian populations widely differ from the disjunct former species (pers. obs.). Those have been described as P. lanciloba Cornejo (Cornejo, 2010).

    Conservation: Not recorded.

    Uses: The pulp of the berries have been reported to be edible (Seemann, 1854).

    Etymology: The specific epithet has been taken from the vernacular name.

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