Miconia friedmaniorum Almeda & Umaña

  • Family

    Melastomataceae (Magnoliophyta)

  • Scientific Name

    Miconia friedmaniorum Almeda & Umaña

  • 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: Costa Rica, Herrera 1900 (CR!).

    Description: Tree 2-5 m tall, the young branchlets, distal petioles, elevated primaries on the abaxial foliar surfaces, and hypanthia densely covered with inconspicuously stalked asperous-headed hairs but glabrate with age, the distal nodes sparingly covered with spreading simple hairs. Leaves of a pair somewhat unequal in length; blades 5-plinerved with uppermost primaries mostly diverging from the median nerve in alternate or subalternate fashion, elliptic to elliptic-ovate, 10.1-14.4 X 5.5-7.2 cm, apex acuminate, base obtuse to conspicuously oblique, entire but varying to inconspicuously denticulate, glabrous adaxially, moderately to sparsely covered with a mixture of inconspicuously asperous headed and scalelike hairs on the secondary and higher order veins abaxially; petioles 2.1-4.8 cm long. Inflorescence a modified cyme 5- 6 cm long, commonly branched from the base; flowers 5-merous on pedicels 1-1.6 mm long; bracts linear-oblong to narrowly triangular, 1.5-4 mm long; bracteoles persistent, triangular, 0.5-1.5 mm long. Calyx fused into a dome in young buds but rupturing at anthesis into 4 or 5 persistent broadly rounded hyaline lobes mostly 0.5- 1.5 X 0.5-1.1 mm; exterior calyx teeth narrowly triangular, 0.5-0.6 mm long, typically exceeding the lobes. Petals pale pink, glabrous, linear-oblong, 2.5-3 X 0.9-1 mm. Anthers isomorphic 1.2-1.5 mm long, yellow, linear-oblong but laterally compressed and ovate-oblong in profile view, somewhat truncate with a dorsally inclined pore; connective thickened dorsally but not prolonged or appendaged at the filament insertion. . Style glabrous, 5 mm long; stigma truncate and somewhat dilated; ovary (at anthesis), 5-locular, ¾ inferior, globose, apex gently fluted, sparingly covered with glandular hairs but lacking a stylar collar. Berry red turning purple when mature, 3-3.5 X 3-3.5 mm. Seeds angular-pyramidate to somewhat crescent-shaped in profile view, testa smooth, ca. 0.5 mm long.

    Habitat and Distribution: Cloud forest. (900- 1700) m. COSTA RICA (Almeda & Anderson 5416, CAS); PANAMA (Penneys 1707, CAS). (Endemic).

    Taxonomy and Systematics: For a detailed comparison of this species and M. pendula, its presumed closest relative, see the protologue.

    Notes: [Description based only on Mesoamerican specimens.]

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