Ceropegia ahmarensis
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| Ceropegia ahmarensis | ||||||||||||
| Masinde |
Ceropegia ahmarensis is a species of the subfamily of the silk plant family (Asclepiadoideae). It is endemic to the Ahmar Mountains of Somalia .
features
Vegetative characteristics
Ceropegia ahmarensis is a perennial upright plant with succulent, climbing shoots. The shoots measure up to 3 millimeters in diameter and are bare. The protruding leaves sit on 3 to 4 millimeter long petioles and are hairy on the edges. The little succulent, bare leaf blades are narrow-egg-shaped, rounded-wedge-shaped at the base and pointed at the end. The edges are covered with fine cilia. They measure 12 to 17 millimeters in length and 5 to 6 millimeters in width. The internodes are up to 6 inches long.
Inflorescence and flowers
The shamrock inflorescence with up to four flowers has a short stalk, the stalk can be up to 4 mm long. The bracts are subpulate, up to a millimeter long. The hermaphrodite flowers are zygomorphic and five-fold with a double flower envelope. They develop one by one. The bare flower stalks are up to 3 millimeters long. The sepals are sub-shaped, 2 mm long, 0.5 mm wide at the base, and glabrous. The tips stick out. The curved, upright crown of unknown color is 24 mm high. The crown bowl is narrow-egg-shaped and measures 17 × 4 mm. It gradually merges into the slim corolla tube measuring 2 mm in cross-section. The corolla, which is bare on the outside, widens towards the top and widens to 3 mm towards the opening of the corolla. Inside it is sparsely covered in the mouth with hair pointing downwards into the tube. The petal lobes are linear in shape, 7 mm long and 1.5 mm wide and fused at the upper ends. They thus form an ellipsoidal, cage-like "window flower" that swells up to 6.5 mm in diameter. The lamina of the lobes are slightly bent outwards along the central axis and thus form a shallow longitudinal furrow in the direction of the longitudinal axis. The secondary crown, which is cup-shaped at the base, has a short stem; 3.2 mm wide and 1.5 mm high. The interstaminal (outer) minor coronet lobes are modified to concave pockets, the free lobes have two tooth-like, upright, 0.7 mm long processes, which are provided with long, inwardly pointing cilia . At the base there are protruding, needle-shaped tufts of hair.
The upright staminal lobes of the corolla, which incline over the stylus head, have a spatula shape and measure 2.5 mm in length and 0.3 mm in width. They are provided with short, downy hair at the top. The anthers (anthers) are subquadratisch and surpass the stylus head. The yellowish, ellipsoidal pollinium measures 0.3 × 0.15 mm.
Fruits and seeds
Fruits and seeds have not yet been described.
Geographical distribution and ecology
The only known specimen so far was collected in Ga-an Libah in the Ahmar Mountains in Northwest Somalia in a Buxus - Juniperus forest at 1650 m above sea level.
literature
- Ulrich Meve: Ceropegia . In: Focke Albers, Ulrich Meve (Hrsg.): Succulents Lexicon Volume 3 Asclepiadaceae (silk plants) . Eugen Ulmer Verlag, Stuttgart 2002, ISBN 3-8001-3982-0 , pp. 61-107.
- Patrick S. Masinde: Ceropegia ahmarensis (Asclepiadaceae: Stapelieae), a New Species from Somalia . In: Kew Bulletin , Vol. 55, No. 1, 2000, pp. 225-228.