genus Lindmania Mez
Taxonomic Change:
- The resurrection of the Guayanian Lindmania comes as a result of further study that puts greater emphasis on the aestivation or overlapping of the sepals. There have been two previous indications of generic difference noted between Lindmania and the Bahian Cottendorfia to which I had reduced it (Smith & Downs, 1974: 212). Robinson (1969: 8) pointed out significant differences in the cell walls of the abaxial epidermis and in the stomata. Recently I verified by specimens the unisexual nature of the flowers in Cottendorfia. Mez (1894, pl. 93) had illustrated it as unisexual although he described the genus as having "Flores hermaphroditi" (p. 502). Finally, I now find that the sepals of Lindmania are convolute with the left side of each overlapping the right of the next one while those of Cottendorfia are cochlear with the anterior sepal overlapping the two posterior ones. —See Smith 1987a p. 690-691
Literature references:
Comments:
- Endemic to upland and highland regions of the Guayana Shield of Venezuela, Guyana, and Brazil; ca. 40 species, 38 in Venezuela. —See Steyermark, Holst et al. 1989
