Zygia coccinea

Title

Zygia coccinea

Author(s)

Rupert C. Barneby

Scientific Name

Zygia coccinea (G.Don) L.Rico

Description

15. Zygia coccinea  (G. Don) L. Rico, Kew Bull. 46: 496. 1991. — Typus infra sub var. coccinea indicator.

Amply macrophyllidious, cauliflorous trees 5-11 (-?) m with usually single gray trunk 6-15(-30) cm dbh, glabrous except for some lft-pulvinules and for minutely puberulent inflorescence, the lvs more or less discolorous when dry, commonly brownish green above and paler olivaceous beneath, dull on both faces, the lax or relatively dense spikes of white, ochroleucous, pink or crimson fls arising from knots on the trunk well below current foliage or randomly from nodes of annotinous branchlets, but not axillary to coeval lvs. Stipules seen on juvenile branchlets but absent from most mature specimens, ovate or lanceolate (1—)2—5 mm, often striately several-nerved. Lf- formula i/(l¹A-)2¹/i—4¹/^, the lfts (6—) 10— 14(—18) per lf; petiole including livid pulvinus 4-27 x 1.4-4.5 mm; a sessile shallow-cupular nectary at apex of petiole ±0.8-2.5 mm diam, similar but smaller ones between most further pairs; pinna-rachises (4.5-)8-22 cm, the longer (furthest) interfoliolar segment 3.5-7 cm; lft-pulvinules livid 2.5-5(-6) mm; lfts distally accrescent, the blades inequilaterally elliptic or oblance-elliptic from cuneate or cuneately attenuate base, shortly acuminate, the furthest pair 11-27 x (3—)4—11 cm, 2.3-3.3(-3.6) times as long as wide; venation pinnate, the centric or slightly displaced, straight or almost straight midrib and 4-7 pairs of major incurved-ascending secondary nerves prominulous on both faces but more so beneath, the first 1-2 secondary nerves on posterior side of midrib produced beyond midblade, the tertiary and reticular venules prominulous only dorsally. Flower-spikes either solitary or fasciculate, the axis including peduncle (7-)9-40 cm; bracts triangular- or lance- acuminate 0.3-0.9 mm, deciduous; fls sessile but the calyx abruptly contracted into a solid, dark-colored obconic or drum-shaped pedicel ±0.15-0.4 mm; perianth either glabrous or thinly puberulent, the corolla tube striate, often emphatically so; calyx campanulate or crateriform, weakly 5-nerved or almost nerveless, at full anthesis often ruptured by the corolla, 0.6-2.6 x 1.2-1.6 mm, the teeth not more than 0.2 mm; corolla subtubular, scarcely dilated at the limb, 5-15 mm, the erect, often unequal lobes ±0.75-1.3 mm; androecium 30-60(-80)-merous, 13-40 mm, the tube (5-)5.5-19.5 mm, the tassel white, ochroleucous, pink or crimson; intrastaminal disc 0.3-0.7 mm; ovary sessile, glabrous; style in most fls about as long as androecium, but in some (probably functionally staminate) fls less than half as long; stigma minute. Pods pendulous, sessile, in profile broad-linear, straight, 15-24 x (2.1-)2.7-4 cm, at first strongly compressed but becoming biconvex and elliptic in cross section or subterete and nearly round in cross section, the sutures then immersed or almost so, the pithy-ligneous valves dull brown, glabrous unless microscopically puberulent along the sutures, in section ±1.6-2.3 mm thick, the exocarp becoming low-tumulose and scurfy in age; dehiscence not seen; seeds (little known), apparently plumply disoid and uniseriate, broadside up, subcontiguous but not mutually distorted, perhaps sometimes more obese and crowded, as broad as the pod-cavity, the exotesta papery, dark brown, pleurogram 0.