Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Shrubs, 2–2.4 m tall, producing distinctive juveniles but these not flowering precociously.

Stems: Stems of juveniles unbranched, armed with numerous prickles consisting of a sharp trichome atop a bulbous multicellular base, stems of adults 0.7–1.5 cm diameter toward apex, 6.3–7.4 cm diam. at base, producing 2 to 4 strongly ascending branches from near the base (sometimes unbranched), armed with stout conic prickles below, becoming smooth toward apex, latex white.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate. Blades juveniles with lamina broadly elliptic, 6.8–15 cm long, 4.6–8.7 cm wide across the segments, 2.3–3.8 cm wide between the segments. adults with lamina 17–37 cm long, 8.5–19 cm wide across the segments, 1.3–10 cm wide between the segments, elliptic or oblong. Apex acuminate (Juveniles and adults). Base juveniles with base truncate; adults with base cuneate or obtuse. Juveniles: Surfaces armed with prickles consisting of a sharp trichome atop a bulbous multicellular base; upper surfaces dark green; lower surfaces light green. Adults: Surfaces armed with prickles consisting of a sharp trichome atop a bulbous multicellular base; upper surfaces dark green; lower surfaces light green, glabrous or pubescent on veins with short stiff curved hairs. Margins (in juvenile plants) pinnately parted; segments triangular, 0.5– 2 x 0.3–1.8 cm, 5 to 8 per side, separated by sinuses, their margin minutely serrulate, acuminate at apex; adults with margin pinnately cleft, parted, or divided; segments narrowly triangular, triangular, or deltate, or shallowly triangular, often falcate, 0.6–10 x 0.8–4.5 cm wide, 6 to 8 per side, separated by sinuses, their margin minutely serrulate, acuminate or acute and apiculate at apex. Juveniles with petiole 2–4.7 cm long, 1.2–2 mm diam. ca. ⅓ as long as the lamina, armed with prickles consisting of a sharp trichome atop a bulbous multicellular base. Adults with petiole 10–13.5 cm long, 3-4.3 mm diam. ⅓–1⁄2 as long as the lamina, sparsely armed with prickles consisting of a sharp trichome atop a bulbous multicellular base. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers in racemes 9– to 45–flowered over their lifetime, but only 4 to 8 flowers present at any given time, arising within the apical rosette of leaves; peduncle and rachis horizontal, 45–90 mm long, 2.5-4 mm diam. sparsely armed with prickles consisting of a sharp trichome atop a bulbous multicellular base; bracts oblong, 1.5–2.2 x 0.8–1 mm, subtending the pedicels, deciduous, rounded or obtuse at apex. Flowers bisexual (perfect); with pedicels spreading, 12–25 mm long, 0.9–1 mm diam. ebracteolate, glabrous. Hypanthium campanulate or obconic, 9–9.5 mm long, 7–9 mm diam. 1/7–1/6 as long as the corolla, glabrous, cuneate at base. Calyx 5-lobed, lobes oblong, 3.5–9.5 x 1.5– 3 mm, abutting at base but distinct, erect, glabrous, the margin entire, acute or rounded and apiculate at apex, tube adnate to ovary. Corolla zygomorphic, white tinged with pink, 59–61 mm long, sparsely pubescent, especially on the lobes; corolla tube arcuate, laterally compressed, 42–46 mm long, 5-6.3 mm tall at base, increasing to 7–9.2 mm tall above the middle before decreasing to 3.8–5.5 mm tall at mouth, cleft dorsally for ca. 1⁄2 its length; dorsal corolla lobes spreading, 14–18 x 1.5–2 mm, ⅓–2/5 as long as tube; ventral corolla lobes deflexed, 11–14 x 0.9–1.7 mm, connate basally for 5-6 mm. Stamens 5, alternate with corolla lobes, connate; filament tube 50–51 mm long, 1.8–2.1 mm diam. glabrous, free from the corolla; anther tube gently decurved, 2.8–3.4 mm diam. at base, tapering to 1.5–2 mm diam. at mouth, glabrous; dorsal anthers 11–12.5 mm long, 1/5–¼ as long as the filament tube; ventral anthers 8–9 mm long, their apex crowned by a tuft of white trichomes 2.5–3 mm long; anthers dithecal, opening by longitudinal slits, coherent but separating after anthesis or connate and forming a tube into which pollen is shed; filaments distinct or connate above, attached to the epigynous nectary disk or to base of corolla, rarely adnate to corolla tube. Ovary inferior, 2-celled; ovule placentation axile; stigma 2-lobed, wet or dry, appressed and nonreceptive as the style grows through the anther tube, pushing out the pollen, after which the stigmas spread apart and become receptive.

Fruit: Berries yellowish orange; broadly ellipsoid or obovoid; 12–13 mm long; 8.5– 10.5 mm diam. crowned by the persistent calyx lobes. Seeds brown; broadly ellipsoid; 0.7 mm long; 0.5 mm diameter; the seed coat Type C of Murata (1992; 1995); smooth; shiny; dicotyledonous embryo embedded in oily endosperm.

Ploidy:

Habitat: Mesic forests.

Elevation Range: ca. 855 m.