Cecropia sciadophylla
Type
Type. Colombia. Amazonas: Río Caquetá, Puerto Miraña, Martius 630(1) (holotype: M, fragment in U).
Synonyms
Ambaiba sciadophylla (Mart.) Kuntze, Cecropia sciadophylla var. juranyiana (A.G.Richt.) Snethl., Cecropia sciadophylla var. decurrens Snethl., Cecropia sciadophylla var. pedroa Cuatrec., Cecropia sciadophylla var. guamuesensis Cuatrec., Cecropia sciadophylla var. subsessilis Cuatrec., Cecropia inchuensis Cuatrec., Ambaiba sciadophylla (Mart.) Kuntze
Species Description
Tree, to 30 m tall. Leafy twigs 1.5-5 cm thick, green to brownish, glabrous or puberulous. Lamina coriaceous, ca. 20 × 20 cm to 100 × 100 cm, the segments (7-) 10-15, lanceolate, the incisions down to the petiole and the segments usually with petioles 1-7 cm long; apices acuminate to acute; upper surface smooth and glabrous; lower surface with sparse brown pluricellular hairs on the (main) veins, with short and sparse arachnoid indumentum in the areoles; lateral veins in the midsegment (25-)30-40(^5) pairs, submarginally loop-connected, unbranched; petiole ca. 20-90 cm long, glabrous; trichilia absent, sometimes a few long white hairs instead of trichilia; stipules 13-50 cm long, red-brown (or greenish), glabrous or sparsely puberulous outside, (densely) tomentose to subsericeous inside. Staminate inflorescences in pairs, erect; peduncle 7-15 cm long, minutely puberulous; spathe 8-18 cm, red-brown (or greenish to yellowish), puberulous outside, glabrous or with sparse arachnoid indumentum inside; spikes ca. 8-15, 7-12 × 0.3-0.8 cm, with stipes to 4 cm long and subglabrous; rachis hairy. Staminate flowers: perianth tubular, ca. 1.5-2.5 mm long, with dense arachnoid indumentum below the apex, the apex slightly convex to plane muriculate; filaments ± swollen, sometimes (?) connate at the base; anthers ca. 1-1.5 mm long, appendiculate, detached, remaining attached to the filament by a bundle of stretched spiral thickenings of tracheary elements at anthesis. Pistillate inflorescences in pairs or solitary, erect to pendulous; peduncle 3-10 cm long, minutely puberulous; spathe 8-12 cm long, the color and indumentum as in the staminate inflorescence; spikes 3-6 (-10), (2-)5-10 × 0.8-1 cm, to 26 × 1.5(-2.5) cm in fruit, (sub)sessile or with stipes to 0.5 cm long and glabrous; rachis hairy with stiff short hairs and/or arachnoid indumentum. Pistillate flowers: perianth ca. 2-3 mm long, with arachnoid indumentum below the apex outside, also in the lower part of the style channel (or absent?) inside, the apex convex to almost plane, muriculate; style rather long, straight, with short hairs; stigma penicillate. Fruit oblongoid to subobovoid, 2-3 mm long, tuberculate.
Authority
Berg, Cornelius C. & Franco Rosselli, Pilar. 2005. Cecropia. Fl. Neotrop. Monogr. 94: 1--230. (Published by NYBG Press)
Amazon basin, the Guiana region (French Guiana to eastern Venezuela), and the llanos region in Colombia.
In primary upland and gallery forest and in secondary growth, in noninundated places, at elevations to ca. 1300 m.