Eschweilera biflava S.A.Mori

  • Family

    Lecythidaceae (Magnoliophyta)

  • Scientific Name

    Eschweilera biflava S.A.Mori

  • Primary Citation

    Monogr. Syst. Bot. Missouri Bot. Gard. 111: 903. 2007

  • Type Specimens

    Specimen 1: Isotype -- A. Chacón 1012, verif. S. A. Mori, 2006

  • Common Names

    repollito

  • Description

    Author: Scott A. Mori

    Type: TYPE. COSTA RICA. Puntarenas, Cantón de Golfito. Bosque Carbonera. Finca La Jilva (8° 24'N, 83°17'W), 25-200 m alt. (fr), A. Chacón 1012 (HOLOTYPE: INB; ISOTYPES: CR, NY).

    Description: Understory trees, 5-20 m tall, the bole with small buttresses at base. Bark rough, with vertically oriented lenticels and an occasional scallop caused by shedding of irregular plates of bark. Leaves: petioles 8-15 mm long; blades 17-27 x 5.5-9.5 cm, elliptic to narrowly elliptic, glabrous, glabrous, sparsely punctuate (difficult to see even with 10x magnification), chartaceous, the base infrequently acute, usually obtuse to rounded, the margins entire, the apex acuminate to long acuminate; secondary veins in 10-16 pairs, plane adaxially, salient abaxially. Inflorescences from branches below leaves (ramiflorous), axillary, or appearing terminal (suprafoliar), usually unbranched, sometimes once-branched, the rachis 0.5-5 cm long, glabrous to puberulous, sparsely lenticellate; pedicel/hypanthium 10-12 mm long, gradually tapered to articulation, not sulcate, glabrous to puberulous, sparsely lenticellate, often tinged with red. Flowers 4.5-5 cm diam.; calyx with 6 lobes, the lobes widely to very widely ovate, 4.5-5 x 5 mm, convex to carinate abaxially, slightly gibbous at base, the bases imbricate to 1/2 length; petals white tinged with yellow, pale yellow, or nearly all white; androecial hood with double coil, more intense yellow than petals. Fruits 3-4 cm diam., globose to depressed globose (including operculum), the calycine ring with calyx-lobes persisting but separate from one another, the infracalycine zone tapered from calycine ring to pedicel, the supracalycine zone ± erect, the pericarp 2-3 mm thick, woody, rough, reddish-brown, lenticels not individually conspicuous, only distinguished from rest of fruit service with a hand lens, the operculum convex, not umbonate or with scarcely developed umbo. Seeds globose, ca. 2 x 2 cm; aril lateral.

    Common names: None known.

    Distribution: Distribution. Known only from the province of Puntarenas on and around the Osa Peninsula.

    Ecology: An understory tree of lowland, wet forests to 750 meters.

    Phenology: Collections of flowers from the vicinity of the Osa Península have been made in May, Jul, Aug, Sep, and Nov. and nearly mature fruiting collections come from Aug and Sep.

    Pollination: No data recorded but most likely pollinated by bees.

    Dispersal: No data recorded but the lateral aril may be eaten by animals.

    Predation: No observations recorded.

    Field characters: This species is characterized by its relatively large leaves that dry reddish brown, unbranched or infrequently once-branched, relatively short infloresence, and the yellow petals and androecial hood with the latter more intense yellow than the former.

    Taxonomic notes: The affinities of this species are unknown.

    Conservation: IUCN Red List: Vulnerable B1+2c, D2 ver 2.3 (World Conservation Monitoring Centre 1998. Eschweilera beebei. In: IUCN 2013. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2013.2. www.iucnredlist.org. Downloaded on 13 March 2014.).

    Uses: None reported.

    Etymology: This species is named after the color of the flowers; the petals are yellow or white tinged with yellows and the androecial hood is intense yellow. More commonly in this genus the petals are white and the androecial hood is yellow.

    Source: This species page is based on Hammel et al. 2007 (Monogr. Syst. Bot. Missouri Bot. Gard. 111: 903) and the Manual de Plantas de Costa Rica.

    Acknowledgements: We are grateful to R. Aguilar for allowing us to use his images to illustrate the characters of this species.

  • Sorry, no descriptions available for this record.