Peperomia rossii

Peperomia rossii is a presumably extinct species of the genus Peperomia ( Peperomia ) from the family of the pepper family ( Piperaceae ). She was endemic to Christmas Island and is named after the Clunies -Ross family, the 1888 Flying Fish Cove, founded the first British settlement on Christmas Island.

Description

It was an epiphytic herbaceous plant, with bare, Stems creeping, rooted at the nodes. The upright flowering shoots were 5 to 10 cm high. The ganzrandigen leaves were mostly opposite, elliptical with pointed leaf base and rounded to slightly pointed top end, hairless and with tiny glands covered. The leaf blade was usually 1 to 3 cm long. The petioles were 3 to 4 mm long.

The inflorescences consisted of single, simple, 2.5 to 4.5 cm long spikes that were either terminally or were in the upper leaf axils. The main axis of the inflorescence was fleshy. There were many, sessile flowers with circular, shield-shaped bracts, which had a diameter of 0.5 mm. The egg-shaped ovary was lost in the main axis. The seated scar was wrong. Nearly spherical inked berries were less than 1 mm long.

Status

Peperomia rossii is known only from the type specimens, which were collected in 1898 by Charles William Andrews and 1900 served as the basis of the first description by Alfred Barton Rendle. When and why this plant disappeared, is unclear.