Tetragastris balsamifera
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Illustration of Tetragastris balsamifera |
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| ( Sw. ) Oken |
Tetragastris balsamifera is a tree in the balsam family from the West Indies , Cuba , Haiti , Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic .
description
Vegetative characteristics
Tetragastris balsamifera grows as an evergreen tree and is up to 15-25 meters high. The trunk diameter reaches about 50 centimeters. The bark is brownish-greyish and relatively smooth and easily cracked, scaly. The tree carries an aromatic resin or a balm .
The alternate, stalked and imparipinnate leaves, with 5–9 leaflets , are up to 20–40 centimeters long. The bald petiole can be up to 10-15 centimeters long. The leathery and shiny, underside lighter and bare leaves are ovate or elliptical to obovate or lanceolate to oblong and up to 18 centimeters long and up to 7 centimeters wide. They have entire margins and are rounded to acuminate, the terminal leaflet has a longer stalk, the rest only short or shorter. The nerve is pinnate, with a lighter central vein that is raised below. The leaflet stalks are often formed with brownish and thickened pulvini . Stipules are missing.
Generative characteristics
Tetragastris balsamifera is dioeciously dioecious . Pedunculated terminal and lateral, multi-flowered and up to 18 centimeters long, paniculate inflorescences are formed. The mostly (functionally) unisexual, small, slightly fragrant flowers are usually four-fold, short stalked and with a double flower envelope. Hermaphrodite flowers can also rarely occur. The greenish, bald calyx is bell-shaped with small tips. The four whitish-brownish and slightly fleshy petals, almost half fused below, are erect and hairy on the outside, with hood-shaped lobes. The male flowers have a short pestle and 8 short, free stamens with very short stamens, as well as a lobed disc . The female flowers are usually vierkammerigen, Upper permanent ovary which lies in a lobed discus. The stylus is short, with a capitate and usually four-part scar and there are staminodes present.
Two- to four-part, -cellular, round, green-brownish to yellowish, opening and leathery stone fruits are formed. Are up to 2.5–3 inches tall and bald. Each cell, separated by the mesocarp , contains light brown, bony and solitary stone cores (pyrene) about 1.5 centimeters long. The fleshy mesocarp contains balsam.
Systematics
The first description of the Basionyms Hedwigia balsamifera was 1788 Olof Swartz in Nova Genera et Species Plantarum seu prodromus 62. The re-allocation to the genus Tetragastris and a more detailed description of the nature Tetragastris balsamifera was carried out in 1841 by Lorenz Oken in General Natural History 3 (3): 1764 -1765. Various synonyms are known.
literature
- EL Little Jr., FH Wadsworth: Common Trees of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Agric. Handb. 240, USDA Forest Service, 1964, p. 240 f, online (PDF; 38.5 MB), from Trees of Puerto Rico - Yola, accessed on April 26, 2019.
- H. Baillon : Histoire des plantes. Vol. 5, 1874, pp. 265 f, online at biodiversitylibrary.org.
- ALP de Candole , ACP de Candolle, Engler : Monographiæ phanerogamarum. Vol. 4, 1883, pp. 95 f, t. 2, online at biodiversitylibrary.org.
Web links
- Tetragastris balsamifera at Flora Virtual de la Estación Biológica El Verde - UPR, accessed on April 26, 2019 (images below on the website with forward).
- Tetragastris balsamifera at Useful Tropical Plants.
Individual evidence
- ↑ James W. Byng: The Flowering Plants Handbook. Plant Gateway, 2014, ISBN 978-0-9929993-0-8 , pp. 272 f.
- ↑ online at biodiversitylibrary.org.
- ↑ online at biodiversitylibrary.org.
- ↑ Tetragastris balsamifera at KEW Science.