Vines and Climbing Plants of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands

388
Vines and Climbing Plants of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands
4-15 × 2.5-8.7 cm, chartaceous, ovate, oblong, or
sometimes obovate, the apex short-acuminate or
sometimes obtuse, the base rounded, cordiform,
or truncate, the margins entire, crenate, or sparsely
serrate; upper surface yellowish green, dull,
glabrous or puberulent, punctate, with three main
veins, sunken; lower surface yellowish green, dull,
glabrous, the venation prominent, with small tufts
of hairs in the axils of the secondary veins; petioles
2-15 mm long. Flowers unisexual or bisexual, the
staminate flowers in branched axillary cymes, the
pistillate or bisexual flowers in simple axillary
cymes. Calyx of discrete sepals, oblong, concave,
48. Family VALERIANACEAE
1. VALERIANA
ciliate, 1-2 mm long; stamens 5, ascendent; ovary
ovoid, with two pubescent styles. Drupe fleshy,
ovoid or almost globose, 6-10(14) mm long,
orange, with persistent styles.
Phenology: Flowering from February to May
and fruiting from May to September.
Status: Native, uncommon.
Distribution: In dry areas along the coast, and
in the area of mogotes. Also on Culebra, Desecheo,
Icacos, Vieques, St. Croix, St. John, and St.
Thomas; throughout the Neotropics.
Public Forest: In all probability, found in
Guánica.
Herbs or less frequently herbaceous vines, twining or scandent, glabrous or pubescent, usually
with a fetid odor. Leaves opposite, simple, entire, dentate, trifoliolate, pinnate, or pinnatisect; stipules
absent. Flowers actinomorphic or slightly zygomorphic, bisexual or rarely unisexual, produced in
terminal or axillary dichasial cymes; bracts and bracteoles present. Calyx tubular, with 5-20 lobes,
dentate, setose or plumose; corolla infundibuliform, campanulate, or hypocrateriform, the tube short,
the lobes 5, expanded; stamens 3(4), adnate to the throat, included or exserted, the anthers sessile;
ovary inferior, 3-carpellate, the carpels with a single ovule, the stigma 2-3-lobate. Fruit a dry indehiscent
achene with a single fertile carpel, crowned by the plumose sepals. An almost cosmopolitan genus, of
approximately 250 species.
1. Valeriana scandens L., Sp. Pl. ed. 2, 47. 1762.
Fig. 158 A-E
Valeriana
Herbaceous vine, twining, attainig 2-3 m in
length. Stems cylindrical, glabrous or puberulent
at the nodes. Leaves opposite, trifoliolate; leaflets
1.3-6 × 0.8-2.2 cm (terminal leaflet larger than
the lateral ones), membranaceous, glabrous,
lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate, the apex
acuminate, the base obtuse, rounded, or truncate,
the margins entire or crenate, the venation slightly
prominent on both surfaces; petioles slender, 1.2-
3 cm long. Flowers in dichasial or
pseudodichotomous cymes with lateral
monochasia. Hypanthium ovoid, ca. 1 mm long,
crowned by 10-12 filiform sepals; corolla narrowly
campanulate, 1.3-1.8 mm long, the lobes 0.2-0.4
mm long; stamens included; style ca. 1 mm long,
with three short stigmatic branches. Achene
flattened, ribbed, ovate, ca. 2.5 mm long, crowned
by a tuft of plumose sepals, ca. 4 mm long
Phenology: Collected in flower from
November to May and in fruit in March.
Status: Native, uncommon.
Distribution: In moist areas of the Cordillera
Central and in the area of mogotes. Also in tropical
continental America, Cuba, Hispaniola, and the
United States (Florida).
Public Forests: Guilarte and Río Abajo.