Colpothrinax

Colpothrinax is a native to Central America and Cuba palm genus.

• 3.1 Notes and references

Features

The representatives are moderately large, solitary, hermaphrodite, repeatedly blooming tree-shaped fan palms. The stem is erect and initially covered with the fibrous leaf sheaths, and later released. The trunk is columnar in Colpothrinax cookii, wrightii strongly bulbous at Colpothrinax.

The chromosome number is unknown.

The leaves are folded induplicat and costapalmat short. The leaf sheath frayed into a coarse, fibrous network or in long, fine, continuous fibers. The petiole is long, flat or slightly furrowed at the top, rounded at the bottom. The handle edges are pointed and densely scaly. The adaxial Hastula is clearly developed, triangular or irregularly lobed. The abaxial Hastula missing.

The leaf blade is circular, and irregular, sometimes divided up over half linealische, simply folded segments. The segments are short bifid at the tip, fat, bald on top and wax coated, except along the ribs, which are scaly. The lower surface is densely covered with small scales.

Inflorescences

The inflorescences are individually between sheets ( interfoliar ), there are several co-exist. They are shorter than the blades and up to four-fold branches. The peduncle is long and round in cross-section. It is enclosed by overlapping bracts and densely hairy. The cover sheet is short, Roehrig, zweikielig laterally and apically to tears. There are four to nine bracts on the inflorescence stalk, if present. You are Roehrig, einkielig and tear on apical. The inflorescence axis is approximately the same length as the stem and just as hairy. There are several (usually 4 to 7) sheets high, similar to those on the handle.

The first-order lateral axes have a distinctive, slightly inflated, brown haired zweikieliges cover page and a similar empty bract. The following bracts are membranous, triangular, very small. The flower-bearing axes ( Rachillae ) are spreading, densely hairy or bald and wear in a spiral arrangement of small bracts supporting each individual, sedentary bloom.

Flowers

The flowers are hermaphrodite. The calyx is cup-shaped, fleshy and carries three short peaks. The crown standing above the chalice clear is fleshy, Roehrig at the base and further divided up into three oblong lobes valvate. These form a sloping flowering cap. The crown may be shorter than the calyx; then they do not include the stamens in the bud and do not fall from the flower. There are six stamens present. Their filaments are fused at the base to a epipetalen cups are connected to the corolla tube and the same length or slightly longer than this. The free filament parts are wide and then strongly narrowed at the base. The anthers are oblong, dorsifix near the base. The connectives are very narrow.

There are three carpels that are free in the area of the ovary, grown together in the area of the elongated stylus. The scar is punctiform. The ovule is sitting basal, erect and anatrop.

The pollen is usually ellipsoidal and slightly asymmetrical. The germ is opening a distal sulcus.

Fruit and seeds

The fruit is globose and usually develops from one carpel. She wears apical scar remains and the remains of the abortive carpels. The perianth remains on the fruit. The exocarp is thin and smooth, the mesocarp is fleshy with anastomosing fibers present at the crust-like endocarp. The seed is approximately spherical, not connected to the endocarp, except in the area of ​​small, basal navel ( hilum ). The raphe is as long as the seed, more broad and without branches. The endosperm is homogeneous.

Systematics and distribution

The genus Colpothrinax is placed in the subfamily Coryphoideae, Tribe Trachycarpeae within the family Arecaceae, but here no one assigned to subtribe ( incertae sedis ). The monophyly of the genus has not yet been investigated.

In the World Checklist of Selected Plant Families of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, the following types are recognized:

• Colpothrinax aphanopetala: in Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama; in humid rain forests of vormontanen and lower montane level to 1600 m.
• Colpothrinax cookii: in Belize, Guatemala and Honduras; Locations such as C. aphanopetala.
• Colpothrinax wrightii: endemic to Cuba, mostly in semi-arid savannas and grasslands.

Colpothrinax was first described by August Grisebach and Hermann Wendland 1879, type species is Colpothrinax wrightii. The genus name derives from the Greek kolpos swelling and the generic name from Thrinax, and refers to the thickened root of the type species.

Documents

• John Dransfield, Natalie W. Uhl, Conny B. Asmussen, William J. Baker, Madeline M. Harley, Carl E. Lewis: Genera palmarum. The Evolution and Classification of Palms. Second edition, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew 2008, ISBN 978-1-84246-182-2, pp. 278-280.