Aiphanes

Authority

Borchsenius, Finn & Bernal-González, Rodrigo. 1996. Aiphanes (Palmae). Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 70: 1-94. (Published by NYBG Press)

Family

Arecaceae

Scientific Name

Aiphanes

Type

Type. Aiphanes aculeata Willdenow.

Synonyms

Martinezia, Marara, Curima, Tilmia

Description

Genus Description - Monoecious, pleonanthic, acaulescent or caulescent understory palms, solitary or caespitose, with up to 20 stems. Stems armed with rings of black, applanate spines inserted in bands or spirals below the nodes, sometimes becoming unarmed with age. Leaves spirally arranged or distichous; sheath open nearly to base in older leaves, densely armed with black or yellow spines; petiole nearly absent or well-developed, armed like sheath or unarmed; rachis rounded below, ridged adaxially, unarmed or spiny; lamina reduplicate, entire, or paripinnately divided with up to 70 pinnae per side, pinnae regularly inserted or grouped, lanceolate to broadly cuneate, apex (or outer margin of entire lamina) praemorse; midrib of pinnae normally with 1 to several rigid spines abaxially. Inflorescences interfoliar, protandrous, erect or curving, often becoming recurved or pendulous in fruit, spicate or branched to 1 or occasionally 2 orders; prophyll short, lanceolate, winged, more or less enclosed in the leaf sheath; peduncular bract long and slender, unarmed or spiny, persistent or soon disintegrating; peduncle normally longer than rachis, more or less spiny; rachillae up to 300, spreading, fastigiate, or appressed, sometimes with a long basal flowerless part; fertile part of proximal rachillae with triads of 1 pistillate and 2 staminate flowers for ca. ½ of their length, sometimes also with a few tetrads of 2 pistillate and 2 staminate flowers, distally with dyads of staminate flowers, or near apex with a few single ones; distal rachillae staminate or with a few triads at base. Flowers unisexual, trimerous. Staminate sepals free or shortly connate, membranous, imbricate, carinate, often cap-shaped and enclosing the entire bud before anthesis; petals free or shortly connate, fleshy, ovate-acuminate, valvate; stamens 6, in 2 whorls, inflexed in bud, filaments basally connate in a ring, anthers latrorse to introrse; pistillode small, trifid. Pistillate flowers generally larger than the staminate; sepals free, cartilaginous, ovate to reniform, imbricate; petals fleshy, connate for ½ their length, lobes acute-acuminate, valvate, or occasionally imbricate; staminodes 6, fused in an acuminately lobed to nearly truncate staminodial cup, rarely incompletely fused; pistil conical, glabrous or spinulose, with 3 sessile stigmas; ovules 3, sub-basal. Fruit globose or ellipsoid, red, or more rarely white, orange, or purple at maturity, glabrous, black spinulose, or golden spiny; mesocarp fleshy to dry; endocarp black at maturity, hard, smooth or variously pitted-grooved, with 3 subequatorial germination pores each surrounded by an asterisk of applanate fibers; seed 1, globose-irregular, brown; endosperm white, homogeneous, with a small to large central cavity. Embryo lateral, conical. Eophyll simple, bifid, spiny, with praemorse outer margin.

Distribution

Twenty-two species distributed in the Lesser Antilles, Trinidad, Venezuela, Panama, and along the Andes from Colombia to Bolivia, reaching 3000 m elev. in Colombia. Most species are found in Colombia (15) and Ecuador (11).

Trinidad and Tobago South America| Venezuela South America| Panama Central America| Colombia South America| Ecuador South America| Peru South America| Bolivia South America|