Miconia ampla Triana

  • Family

    Melastomataceae (Magnoliophyta)

  • Scientific Name

    Miconia ampla Triana

  • Primary Citation

    Trans. Linn. Soc. London 28: 101. 1871

  • Description

    Description Author and Date: Frank Almeda, based on Almeda, F. (2009). Melastomataceae. In: G. Davidse, M. Sousa-Sânchez, S. Knapp, & F. Chiang (eds.), Flora Mesoamericana: Cucurbitaceae a Polemoniaceae. 4(1): 164-338.

    Type: Holotype: Trinidad, Lockhart s.n. (K!).

    Description: Tree or shrub (1-) 4-20 m tall, the young branchlets, petioles, inflorescence and juvenile lower leaf surfaces covered with a deciduous amorphous appressed indument, the nodes with a conspicuous interpetioler line. Leaves 5-7(-11)-plinerved, elliptic to oblong-elliptic, 20-47 x 8-25 cm, adaxially glabrous, apex abruptly short-acuminate, base obtuse to rounded, the margin entire to obscurely undulate; petioles 0.1-0.5(-1) cm long. Panicle 20-40 cm long, the 6-merous flowers sessile and enveloped by a pair of deciduous elliptic-ovate bracts 6-8 mm long; hypanthium 5-7 mm long beset with an evanescent amorphous white indument; calyx lobes 1.5-2.5 mm long, oblong-ovate and deciduous at anthesis, the thickened exterior triangular teeth projecting 1 mm. Petals obovate-oblong, glabrous, 5-8 x 3-4 mm. Stamens slightly dimorphic; anthers subulate, 5-7 mm long, purple, the larger with a ventrally inclined pore, the smaller with a dorsally inclined pore; the connective ventrally bilobulate at the base and somewhat dilated but not conspicuosly prolonged dorso-basally. Style glabrous or obscurely glandular basally, 1.4-1.5 mm long; stigma clavate-truncate; ovary 4-locular, ca. 1/10 inferior, glabrous; berry 8-10 X 7-10 mm, greenish-yellow turning blue-black when mature. Seeds elliptic-ovate in outline, brown-black and tuberculate at maturity; 1-1.5 mm long.

    Habitat and Distribution: Local, rain forest, river margins. 0-520 m. Southern Mexico (Oaxaca and Veracruz) southward, Greater Antilles (Jamaica), Trinidad, all the Guianas, Venezuela and Colombia south to Bolivia and W Brazil. MEXICO: Chiapas (Martínez 13580, CAS); BELIZE (Gentle 4804, CAS); GUATEMALA (Contreras 9248, CAS ); HONDURAS (Liesner 26140, MO); NICARAGUA (de la Cerda et al. 3489, CAS); COSTA RICA (Wilbur 63320, CAS); PANAMA (Foster et al. 14690, CAS ).

    Notes: [Description based only on Mesoamerican specimens.]

  • Sorry, no descriptions available for this record.