Costa Rica nightshade
| Costa Rica nightshade | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Costa Rican nightshade ( Solanum wendlandii ) |
||||||||||||
| Systematics | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Solanum wendlandii | ||||||||||||
| Hook.f. |
The Costa Rican nightshade ( Solanum wendlandii ) is in Central America -based plants art from the genus Solanum ( Solanum ) in the family of the nightshade family (Solanaceae).
description
Vegetative characteristics
The Costa Rican nightshade is a sturdy, perennial climber . The shoot axes are herbaceous to woody and measure 0.25 to 0.8 cm in diameter. They are hairless and can be studded with strong, up to 1 mm long and curved back spines. The internodes are 1 to 10 cm long, several internodes and leaves are combined in a sympodial unit , but they are not paired.
The leaves of a plant are also very variable in shape; in addition to simple leaves, there can also be pinnate leaves. The leaf blades have a length of 10 to 12 cm and a width of 8 to 15 mm, while they are about 1.2 times as long as they are wide. Their outline is egg-shaped or rarely elliptical, the widest point is at the base. The leaf surface is membranous and hairless on both sides, or rarely slightly hairy on the underside with unbranched trichomes , the central axis is often covered with curved spines on the underside. Five to eight pairs of side veins extend from the central axis. The leaf base is rounded to pointed, the leaf edge is whole or differently divided into three to seven pinnate to pinnate leaf parts, the front and side leaves are broadly converging. The leaves are pointed to rounded to the front. The leaf stalks are 1.5 to 7 cm long, hairless, but often covered with curved spines.
Inflorescences and flowers
The plants are mostly dioecious , so there are either only male or only female flowers on a plant. Only rarely are the plants Andomonözisch, that is, they have both male and hermaphrodite flowers. The inflorescences are terminal and are mostly branched, 10 to 20 cm long and wide, consist of 20 to 30 flowers. The axes of the inflorescences are hairless and occasionally covered with curved spines at the base. The peduncle is 5 to 10 cm long, the rhachis 5 to 20 cm. The flower stalks are in groups at the ends of the inflorescence axes, they are slender and 15 to 20 mm long at the flowering time, become slightly woody on the fruit and enlarge to a length of 30 to 50 mm and a diameter of 3 mm. At the base, the flower stalks are clearly divided. Before the flowers open, the buds are spherical.
The calyx is spread and bell-shaped. It has a 2 to 9 mm long corolla tube, which is covered with 3 × 2 mm large, rounded lobes that are pointed at the tip and can be finely haired. On the fruit, the calyx is permanent and enlarged. The crown has a diameter of 2.5 to 6 cm, is wheel-shaped pentagonal and has plenty of additional tissue between the petals. The petals are broadly ovate, membranous, hairless, light blue to purple in color and not fused together for about 1/3 of the length. They are 10 to 40 mm long and 4 to 20 mm wide. The corolla tube is 2 to 4 mm long.
The stamens have a length of 5 to 10 mm. The stamens are hairless, of unequal length, four are between 1 and 1.5 mm, the fifth 2.5 to 4 mm long. The dust bags are almost the same size, they are between 4 and 10 mm long and 1.5 to 2 mm wide, the dust bag on the longer stamina is only slightly larger. They are narrow, elongated, inclined together and colored yellow, they open via pores at the tips, which later lengthen into slits. The ovary is smooth, the stylus is in female flowers about 12 mm long, has mm a diameter of 0.5, is straight, and carries a truncated hairless scar .
Fruits and seeds
The fruits measure 3 to 5 cm in diameter. They are spherical, green even when ripe, and have green to white flesh. The surface is hairless and becomes wrinkled when the fruits dry. The seeds are 4 × 6 mm in size, strongly flattened and light brown in color. The surface is provided with fine pits.
Distribution and locations
The home of the species is in the humid forests of Central America , between southern Mexico and Panama and Colombia . It grows there at altitudes between 400 and 2200 m.
use
The Costa Rican nightshade is often cultivated as a container plant, mostly clones of male plants. Some notes on herbarium specimens say that parts of the plants are cooked and eaten in their home in Central America.
Systematics
Solanum wendlandii belongs to a group of nightshade species that have spines but no star-shaped bifurcated trichomes. Although this form of hairiness is atypical for the subgenus Leptostemonum , these species have long been assigned to this subgenus as the section Aculeigerum . Molecular biological studies showed, however, that this group is not closely related to the other sting-bearing nightshade species. In the molecular-biological, phylogenetic system of the nightshade , these species are listed as Wendlandii / Allophyllum clade.
proof
literature
- Sandra Knapp: Solanum wendlandii . In: Solanaceae Source ( online ), July 2006, accessed February 12, 2011.
Individual evidence
- ^ Walter Erhardt et al .: The Timber Press Dictionary of Plant Names . Timber Press, 2010, ISBN 978-1-60469115-3
