Begonia decandra Pav.
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Authority
Britton, Nathaniel L. Flora Borinqueña.
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Family
Begoniaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Species Description - Characteristic of the ground vegetation of Porto Rico mountain forests, and growing naturally nowhere else, while not as showy as many of its cultivated relatives, this plant is attractive by its rather small, clustered, rose or white flowers; it is most luxuriant in wet or moist places, and most plentiful at higher elevations; we have not observed it at lower altitudes than about 450 meters. The nearest relative of this endemic species, is, perhaps, Begonia obliqua of Jamaica and Cuba. The natural order Begoniales, consists only of the family Begoniaceae, with perhaps 400 species, all but one of them classified in the genus Begonia by most authors, although segregation into several genera has been proposed, and would probably be preferable, inasmuch as the usual grouping appears to be heterogeneous. The genus, commemorating Michel Begon, a French governor of Santo Domingo, born in 1638, was dedicated to him by the French botanist Plumier, and accepted by Linnaeus, with Begonia obliqua as the typical species. They are all herbaceous plants, more or less fleshy, with alternate, oblique leaves, and clustered, imperfect flowers, some with stamens and a rudimentary pistil, some with a fertile pistil, but without stamens, both kinds borne on the same plant (monoecious) the staminate flowers usually have 2 sepals, with or without petals, the stamens usually numerous, their anthers continuous with the filaments; the pistillate flowers have from 2 to 5 sepals and petals, a usually 3-celled ovary containing many ovules, the 2 to 5 styles often 2-cleft. The fruit-is a capsule in most species, opening when mature to release the many, minute, reticulated seeds. Begonia decandra (ten stamens, but, perhaps not always), is upright, sometimes rather stout, branched, and 2 meters high, more commonly lower, and without branches. The rather thin, broad, green or purple, pointed leaves are from 5 to 12 centimeters long, their hairy stalks from 1 to 6 centimeters long, their margins irregularly toothed, the upper side smooth, the lower side hairy along the veins. The flower-clusters are long-stalked in the leaf-axils; the individual flowers are slender-stalked, the stalks of the pistillate ones shorter than those of the staminate; both kinds have about 5 broad petals 10 or 12 millimeters long. The capsular fruit is about 10 millimeters long, with a triangular, thin wing 10 to 25 millimeters long.
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Discussion
Porto Rico Begonia Begonia Family Begonia decandra Pavon; De Candolle , Annales des Sciences Naturelles IV. 11: 122. 1859. Begonia portoricensis A. De Candolle, Prodromus 15: 295. 1864.