Ceropegia albisepta
| Ceropegia albisepta | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Ceropegia albisepta | ||||||||||||
| Yeah & H.Perrier |
Ceropegia albisepta is a species of the subfamily of the silk plant family (Asclepiadoideae). The type in the current version is very variable; the distribution area extends from Madagascar, over East Africa to Zaire.
features
Vegetative characteristics
Ceropegia albisepta is a perennial , twining plant with up to 6 m long shoots and fibrous roots. The shoots are succulent and measure 4 to 7 mm in cross section, at the base even more. They are green to blue-green, the surface is smooth or warty-uneven. The leaves are stalked, the petioles between 5 and 15 mm long. The more or less succulent leaf blades are linear to ovate, 1 to 8 cm long and 1 to 6 cm wide. They are blunt to pointed at the outer end, e.g. T. also tapered-pointed. They are just short-lived and fresh, bright green and shiny.
Inflorescence and flowers
The inflorescence is multi-flowered, but usually only one flower is open. The fleshy inflorescence stalk becomes one to ten, rarely up to 15 centimeters long. The hermaphrodite zygomorphic flowers are five-fold and provided with a double flower envelope. The flower stalks are 0.5 to 3 cm long. The sepals are narrow-lanceolate in shape and 0.5 to 1 cm long. The outside bare corolla is 3.5 to 6 cm high. The (basic) color (inside and outside) varies from whitish-green, greenish to yellowish; red-brown spots or spots are distributed irregularly on it. The spherical to cylindrical crown bowl is 9 to 13 millimeters long and has a diameter of 7 to 11 millimeters. At the upper end it merges conically or rather abruptly into the narrow corolla tube, which has a diameter of only 3 to 5 mm. With some flowers, the corolla tube is even sunk into the corolla cup and forms a more or less deep furrow around the corolla tube. Towards the upper end of the corolla it widens strongly like a funnel to 14 to 20 mm in cross section. The funnel is sparsely hairy on the inside. The triangular corolla lobes are 10 to 30 mm long, drawn out blunt to linear towards the end and more or less intensively connected with each other. The lamina of the tip are bent outwards along the midrib and thus form a wide keel on the inside. The insides that are now facing outwards are whitish to greenish and sometimes green or reddish-brown. The bald or hairy ends of the tips are usually purple, green, brown or yellow in color. On the edges there are white or purple hairs, e.g. T. with purple clubs. The greenish, very variable hairy corolla is only short stalked or almost sessile; the diameter is 4 to 5 mm. The base is grown together like a bowl. The ascending, interstaminal corolla lobes run out in the middle at the upper end into linear processes. They are 2 mm long and connected at the ends. The staminal corolla lobes are 2 to 3 mm long, linear to spatulate in shape, stand upright and are inclined above the stylus head. The pollinium is egg-shaped and has dimensions of 0.4 × 0.28 mm.
Fruits and seeds
The paired follicles are almost parallel or only form a small acute angle. They are 10 to 24 cm long with a diameter of 4 to 8 mm. They are colored blue-green and smooth on the outside. The seeds measure 10 to 15 mm in length and 2 to 4 mm in width and have a 2.5 to 5.5 cm long head of hair.
Geographical distribution and ecology
The species was first described from Madagascar. If one follows the broad species concept, the distribution area extends further to Kenya, Uganda and Zaire. However, it has not yet been clarified whether these East to Central African populations actually belong to Ceropegia albisepta . The area of distribution would be limited accordingly.
Systematics and taxonomy
The species was first described by Henri Jumelle and Henri Perrier de la Bathie in 1908. The type location is near Ambongo, near Andranomavo, south of Mahajanga ( Mahajanga province ) in northwest Madagascar. Ulrich Meve in the succulent lexicon takes the species very broadly and gives a long list of synonyms:
- Ceropegia decaryi Choux (1925)
- Ceropegia helicoidea Choux (1925)
- Ceropegia verrucosa Choux (1925)
- Ceropegia viridis Choux (1925)
- Ceropegia albisepta var. Viridis (Choux) H. Huber (1957)
- Ceropegia robynsiana Werdermann (1938)
- Ceropegia albisepta var.robynsiana (Werdermann) H. Huber (1957)
- Ceropegia succulenta E.A. Bruce (1941)
- Ceropegia evelynae E.A. Bruce & PRO Bally (1950)
- Ceropegia albisepta var. Bruceana H. Huber (1957)
- Ceropegia albisepta var. Truncata H. Huber (1957)
- Ceropegia viridis var. Truncata (H. Huber) H. Huber (1970) (nom. Inval., Art. 33.2).
In this broad view, the species is very variable in leaf size, the length of the corolla lobes and the hairiness of the corolla. Meve himself stated (p. 63/4): "The inclusion of African taxa such as Ceropegia robynsiana / Ceropegia succulenta is very questionable. The East African Ceropegia ballyana is phylogenetically closer to them than the Malagasy Ceropegia albisepta ." Future investigations must be awaited here as to whether the distribution area of the Malagasy species actually extends to East Africa and, if so, which of the above taxa are actually synonyms.
supporting documents
literature
- Ulrich Meve: Ceropegia . In: Focke Albers, Ulrich Meve (Hrsg.): Succulents Lexicon Volume 3 Asclepiadaceae (silk plants) . Pp. 61-107, Eugen Ulmer Verlag, Stuttgart 2002. ISBN 3-8001-3982-0
- Herbert FJ Huber : Revision of the genus Ceropegia. In: Memórias da Sociedade Broteriana , Volume 12, 1957, pp. 1–203, Coimbra (description by C. albisepta pp. 76/7)
Individual evidence
- ^ Henri Jumelle & Henri Perrier de la Bathie: Notes biologiques sur la végétation du Nord-Ouest de Madagascar; les Asclépiadées. In: Annales du Musée colonial de Marseille , 2nd series, Volume 6, 1908, pp. 131-239, Marseille. Online at archive.org