Cassiinae pt 1 NY-Botanical_gardens_Vol. 35_1 - Copy.pdf - Antbase

1982] CASSIINAE—SENNA 307
PUosulous with incurved-ascending yeUowish hairs up to 0.3-0.55 mm; gland
sohtary between first pair of lfts; longer lfts ovate or lance-ovate, at apex deltateor
triangular acute (2.8-)4-7.5 x 1.5-2.2 cm, 2.1-3.7 times as long as wide; ra­
cemes 20-35-fld, the axis and peduncle together 9-15 cm; outer sepals ±4.5 mm,
the inner ones 6 mm; longer petals 7.5-8 mm; pod and seed unknown.—Collec­
tions: 4.
Humid pine-oak forest on karst Umestone, 1500-1700 m, descending on rio
Guayalejo to 300 m, known only from Sa. de Guatemala, a spur of Sa. Madre
Oriental near 23°20'N in s.-w. Tamaulipas.
The var. calcarea, the northernmost known expression of S. guatemalensis,
derives from its ovate acute leaflets a facies distinct from all other forms of its
species. Otherwise it closely resembles var. hidalgensis, especially in the solitary
petiolar gland and in form of the inflorescence, but a close comparison of the
flowers reveals in var. calcarea slightly shorter petals (the longest 7.5-8, not
8-11.5 mm) and decidedly shorter anthers, those of the 3 abaxial stamens 3-3.5
(not 4-4.5) mm long. Sierra de Guatemala hes about 180 km north ofthe nearest
known station for var. hidalgensis, the range of which is separated from that of
var. calcarea by the depression in the Sierra crest formed by the barrancas of
the Rio Verde system.
95. Senna versicolor (Vogel) Irwin & Barneby, comb. nov. Cassia versicolor
Meyen [Reise 1: 483. 1834, nom. nud.] ex Vogel, Syn. Gen. Cass. 29.
1837.—Typus infra sub var. versicolori indicatur.
Densely leafy, clumped or mounded subshrubs becoming straggling shrubs or
(in forest) spindly treelets, at anthesis (0.6-)l^ m, appearing glabrous but the
angulate hornotinous branchlets, h-stalks and inflorescence at least thinly (rarely
quite densely) pilosulous or strigulose with straight appressed or loosely ascend­
ing filiform hairs often mixed with short thickened livid trichomes, the thicktextured
foliage strongly bicolored, the hts dull oUvaceous or yellowish-green
above, darker green or brownish beneath, the inflorescence a squat pyramidal or
subcorymbiform, immersed or shortly exserted panicle of racemes.
Stipules ascending or in age variably spreading or deflexed, thinly herbaceous
becoming dry and brownish, in outline lance- or triangular-acuminate (4-)
5-18 X (l-)1.5-6(-7) mm, symmetrical or at base quite inequilateraUy dilated,
the margins early rephcate, the blades deciduous before the associated If.
Lvs often crowded toward end of branches, (of some axillary branchlets
(5_)8_19(_22) cm, in expanded outhne oblong-eUiptic, the proximal and distal lfts
slightly decrescent; petiole subangulate when dry, including discolored pulvinus
(2-)4-15(-19) mm, at middle 0.8-1.8(-2) mm diam, openly shaUowly grooved
ventraUy; rachis mostly 5.5-16(-18) cm, charged at insertion of lfts with a conspicuous
tuft of spicules; gland between proximal pair of lfts erect or incurved
stipitate, including stipe (1.5-) 1.7-3.4 mm, the ovoid to lancoid acute or obovoid
claviform head 0.45-1 mm diam; pulvinules l-1.7(-2) mm; lfts (6-)8-13(-15) pairs,
in ouriine narrowly ovate, lanceolate or narrowly lance-eUiptic, obtuse mucronu­
late or subacute, the longer ones (1.8-)2-3.6 x (0.45-)0.5-l.l cm, (2.3-)3^.2(-5)
times as long as wide, at base inequUateraUy rounded or broadly cuneate, the
margins plane, the coarse centric midrib prominent beneath only, the venation
of upper face fully immersed, but 6-11 pairs of camptodrome whh rare intercalary
secondary veins somerimes fainriy raised or immersed but discolored beneath.
Racemes (7-)12-45-fld, the 1-3 simultaneously open fls raised ± to level ofthe