Pitcairnia karwinskyana Schult. & Schult.f.
Literature references:
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Comments:
- From McVaugh in Flora Nov. Galiciana 1989
This is the oldest name for a group of Mexican species (14 species, as circumscribed by L. B. Smith in 1974) in which the larger leaf-blades are grasslike and deciduous along a straight transverse line above the sheath, and (at least in ours) prickly-serrate on the margins below the line of abscission; the petals are naked (i.e., without a scale on the inner side at base), usually red, 3.5-7 cm long; the flowers are pedicellate, the pedicels in ours mostly 10-15 mm long.
The species that have been recognized in this group have been distinguished chiefly by vegetative characters, e.g., the size and shape of the scape-bracts and the floral bracts; the toothing (or lack of it) on the leaf-margins; the sepals (especially whether winged or keeled); pubescence seems to have played a minor but not negligible role.
According to Smith (in Smith & Downs, 1974), Pitcairnia karwinskyana has a wide distribution in Mexico, from s Zac. on the Pacific side through Jal., Gro., Mex. (Cristo, Karwinski [in 1827], M, the holotype), Mor., and Oax. to Chis., and on the Atlantic side in Pue. and S.L.P. In Nueva Galicia P. karwinskyana appears to be represented by a relatively widespread plant with nearly glabrous herbage, and perhaps by other more pubescent plants that are (as far as known) more localized. All these were included by Smith in P. karwinskyana, as indicated by his annotations on our specimens and by his citations in Flora Neotropica (1974). In the following pages primary consideration is given to the glabrous variant that seems to be the prevailing one in Nueva Galicia:
Pitcairnia karwinskyana Schult. f., sensu lato. Pitcairnia jaliscana S. Wats. Proc. Amer. Acad. 22: 456. 1887.
Rocky hillsides in oak forest, rocky ravines, shaded bluffs, 1200-2200 m on the Central Plateau, in the Santiago basin and the mountains of the Pacific slope, flowering Jun-Sep (-?Nov).
N Nay., s Zac., Jal. (Rio Blanco, Palmer 348 in 1886, GH!, holotype of P. jaliscana).
Between Dolores and Santa Gertrudis (Rose 2040, US); in the Sierra Madre near Santa Teresa (Rose s.n., US); between Bolanos and Guadalajara (Rose 3041, US); "4 mi" NNE of Talpa de Allende (McVaugh 20112); "2 mi" NW of Tequila (McVaugh 18651); road to La Primavera, ca "17 mi" W of Guadalajara (Stevens 1918); Los Camachos, in the barranca N of Guadalajara (Diaz Luna 246); Mpio. Zapopan (Rio Blanco, Cerro del Diente, Rodriguez & L. Guzman 330; Cerro del Colli, Carvajal 278; Sierra de la Venta, Rio Caliente, Puga 4676; all at IBUG); "3 mi" E of Ayo el Chico (McVaugh 17166); 35 km E of Arandas (McVaugh 24351).
Stemless, 25-40 cm high, bulbous at base, producing new bulbs at the ends of short blackish scaly rhizomes; leaf-sheaths pale brown to castaneous; blades dimorphic, some (often inconspicuous) reduced to linear flat dark serrate spines (up to 1-2 mm wide, or setiform) with filiform deciduous tips, others foliaceous, deciduous, linear, attenuate, up to 20-30 cm long and I cm wide, abaxially thinly flocculose or with a few hairlike scales, entire except below the line of abscission; scape slender, 2-3 mm thick, mostly exposed by the bracts, glabrous or thinly pilose; lowermost scape-bracts reduced to a sheath with caudate-spiniform tip, or leafy and deciduous, with blades 13-35 cm long and 5-12 mm wide, the median and upper bracts gradually reduced upward, the median sometimes leafy, not deciduous or tardily so, sometimes with caudate tip 8-12 cm long; upper bracts like the floral bracts, 2-3 cm long, subulate-tipped or caudate; inflorescence a simple raceme, not secund, rather densely (few-) 12-20-flowered, the axis 5-15 cm long, glabrous or essentially so; floral bracts red, ascending, 1.5-3 cm long, glabrous or with a few marginal scales near tip, lance-ovate and acuminate to lanceolate and caudate, usually longer than the pedicels; pedicels erect, 10 (-15) mm long, glabrous, or thinly flocculose at the base of the ovary, angled or 2-edged; sepals glabrous, 24-26 mm long, with narrowly acute tips, the adaxial pair winged dorsally; flowers erect, the corolla usually arching outward at anthesis or soon thereafter; petals 5.2-5.8 cm long, naked, red ("scarlet," "scarlet red"), slightly surpassing the tips of the anthers; anthers yellow, ca 8-10 mm long; fruit excluding any beak 10-I1 mm long; seeds ca 4 mm long including the tails, the body 1.5-1.7 mm long.
Watson (1887) noted correctly that in Pitcairnia jaliscana the "flowering stem" was "mostly glabrous" and the raceme glabrous. When annotating,the holotype of P. jaliscana (Palmer 348), L. B. Smith commented that in the contemporary published illustration of this species (Gard. & For. 1: 197. fig. 35. 1888 ) the specimen has large foliaceous lower scape-bracts, "matching the type of .P. karwinskyana in this and other details very closely."
Apparently the plant described above is primarily saxicolous, and an inhabitant ; of moderately xeric habitats. The following, montane and local as far as known, is described by collectors as terrestrial:
Growing in clay soils of ravines and stream-banks, in pine forest, montane, 2000-2200 m, flowering Jun-Sep.
Jai., Sierra del Tigre, "3 miles" or "several miles" S of Mazamitla (Gregory & Eiten 113, young fl, 18 Jun; McVaugh 13091, fl & young fr, 20 Sep).
Plants robust, 30-50 cm high, noticeably vestite (scape and floral axis, pedicels, bracts and leaves abaxially flocculose; sepals thinly flocculose, the leaves sometimes almost glabrous); scape (3-) 5-7 mm thick; lowermost scape-bracts not leafy, sheathing, with filiform entire or prickly tips; median scape-bracts foliaceous, sometimes deciduous; upper scape-bracts like the floral bracts but narrower and with longer caudae, 3.8-4.5 cm long; raceme 15-20 cm long with 15-26 flowers; floral bracts conspicuous, 1.5-4 cm long; pedicels 9-15 (-30) mm long; sepals 24-30 mm long, the adaxial pair winged or keeled; corolla 4.5-6 cm long. Smith (in Smith & Downs, 1974) cited Gregory & Eiten 113 under the name of Pitcairnia karwinskyana and McVaugh 13091 as P. pteropoda L. B. Smith (Contr. Gray Herb. II. 117: 26. pl. 2, fig. 19. 1937, the holotype from Uruapan, Mich., Holway 3619, GH!). The two specimens, however, are from essentially the same locality and perhaps from the same small stream-valley, and it seems unlikely that they represent different species, though they differ in aspect. The June specimen is noticeably flocculose; the plant bears a young raceme mostly in bud, the paired sepals are provided with a stiff wing 1 mm wide, the floral bracts are about as conspicuous as the flowers. In the September specimen much of the pubescence has been eroded away, the paired sepals bear a thick obtuse keel 0.7 mm high, the open flowers and developing fruits dwarf the bracts. The median scape-bracts are foliaceous in both, but evidently more mature and longer (up to 40 cm vs. 25 cm)- in the September specimen. The lowermost scape-bracts in the June specimen terminate in spiniform aculeate blades, as described for P. pteropoda, but in neither specimen are the flowers visibly secund, as also described for that species, and as in the holotype. The scape-bracts in P. pteropoda are described as "vaginiform, much exceeded by the leaves," thus apparently unlike both the above specimens. I suggest that specific limits are insufficiently known in the group that includes P. karwinskyana, P. pteropoda, P. foliacea, and P. ringens, all of which are reported from our area, and that further field-study of local populations should be used to study variation especially of the sepals (whether consistently winged or keeled), of the scape-bracts (whether or not consistently foliaceous at some levels, and whether or not the lowest ones are consistently spinose-tipped). p. Flora Nov Galiciana
- This is the oldest name for a group of Mexican species (14 species, as circumscribed by L. B. Smith in 1974) in which the larger leaf-blades are grasslike and deciduous along a straight transverse line above the sheath, and (at least in ours) prickly-serrate on the margins below the line of abscission; the petals are naked (i.e., without a scale on the inner side at base), usually red, 3.5-7 cm long; the flowers are pedicellate, the pedicels in ours mostly 10-15 mm long.
The species that have been recognized in this group have been distinguished chiefly by vegetative characters, e.g., the size and shape of the scape-bracts and the floral bracts; the toothing (or lack of it) on the leaf-margins; the sepals (especially whether winged or keeled); pubescence seems to have played a minor but not negligible role.
According to Smith (in Smith & Downs, 1974), Pitcairnia karwinskyana has a wide distribution in Mexico, from s Zac. on the Pacific side through Jal., Gro., Mex. (Cristo, Karwinski [in 1827], M, the holotype), Mor., and Oax. to Chis., and on the Atlantic side in Pue. and S.L.P. In Nueva Galicia P. karwinskyana appears to be represented by a relatively widespread plant with nearly glabrous herbage, and perhaps by other more pubescent plants that are (as far as known) more localized. All these were included by Smith in P. karwinskyana, as indicated by his annotations on our specimens and by his citations in Flora Neotropica (1974). In the following pages primary consideration is given to the glabrous variant that seems to be the prevailing one in Nueva Galicia:
Pitcairnia karwinskyana Schult. f., sensu lato. Pitcairnia jaliscana S. Wats. Proc. Amer. Acad. 22: 456. 1887.
Rocky hillsides in oak forest, rocky ravines, shaded bluffs, 1200-2200 m on the Central Plateau, in the Santiago basin and the mountains of the Pacific slope, flowering Jun-Sep (-?Nov).
N Nay., s Zac., Jal. (Rio Blanco, Palmer 348 in 1886, GH!, holotype of P. jaliscana).
Between Dolores and Santa Gertrudis (Rose 2040, US); in the Sierra Madre near Santa Teresa (Rose s.n., US); between Bolanos and Guadalajara (Rose 3041, US); "4 mi" NNE of Talpa de Allende (McVaugh 20112); "2 mi" NW of Tequila (McVaugh 18651); road to La Primavera, ca "17 mi" W of Guadalajara (Stevens 1918); Los Camachos, in the barranca N of Guadalajara (Diaz Luna 246); Mpio. Zapopan (Rio Blanco, Cerro del Diente, Rodriguez & L. Guzman 330; Cerro del Colli, Carvajal 278; Sierra de la Venta, Rio Caliente, Puga 4676; all at IBUG); "3 mi" E of Ayo el Chico (McVaugh 17166); 35 km E of Arandas (McVaugh 24351).
Stemless, 25-40 cm high, bulbous at base, producing new bulbs at the ends of short blackish scaly rhizomes; leaf-sheaths pale brown to castaneous; blades dimorphic, some (often inconspicuous) reduced to linear flat dark serrate spines (up to 1-2 mm wide, or setiform) with filiform deciduous tips, others foliaceous, deciduous, linear, attenuate, up to 20-30 cm long and I cm wide, abaxially thinly flocculose or with a few hairlike scales, entire except below the line of abscission; scape slender, 2-3 mm thick, mostly exposed by the bracts, glabrous or thinly pilose; lowermost scape-bracts reduced to a sheath with caudate-spiniform tip, or leafy and deciduous, with blades 13-35 cm long and 5-12 mm wide, the median and upper bracts gradually reduced upward, the median sometimes leafy, not deciduous or tardily so, sometimes with caudate tip 8-12 cm long; upper bracts like the floral bracts, 2-3 cm long, subulate-tipped or caudate; inflorescence a simple raceme, not secund, rather densely (few-) 12-20-flowered, the axis 5-15 cm long, glabrous or essentially so; floral bracts red, ascending, 1.5-3 cm long, glabrous or with a few marginal scales near tip, lance-ovate and acuminate to lanceolate and caudate, usually longer than the pedicels; pedicels erect, 10 (-15) mm long, glabrous, or thinly flocculose at the base of the ovary, angled or 2-edged; sepals glabrous, 24-26 mm long, with narrowly acute tips, the adaxial pair winged dorsally; flowers erect, the corolla usually arching outward at anthesis or soon thereafter; petals 5.2-5.8 cm long, naked, red ("scarlet," "scarlet red"), slightly surpassing the tips of the anthers; anthers yellow, ca 8-10 mm long; fruit excluding any beak 10-I1 mm long; seeds ca 4 mm long including the tails, the body 1.5-1.7 mm long.
Watson (1887) noted correctly that in Pitcairnia jaliscana the "flowering stem" was "mostly glabrous" and the raceme glabrous. When annotating,the holotype of P. jaliscana (Palmer 348), L. B. Smith commented that in the contemporary published illustration of this species (Gard. & For. 1: 197. fig. 35. 1888 ) the specimen has large foliaceous lower scape-bracts, "matching the type of .P. karwinskyana in this and other details very closely."
Apparently the plant described above is primarily saxicolous, and an inhabitant ; of moderately xeric habitats. The following, montane and local as far as known, is described by collectors as terrestrial:
Growing in clay soils of ravines and stream-banks, in pine forest, montane, 2000-2200 m, flowering Jun-Sep.
Jai., Sierra del Tigre, "3 miles" or "several miles" S of Mazamitla (Gregory & Eiten 113, young fl, 18 Jun; McVaugh 13091, fl & young fr, 20 Sep).
Plants robust, 30-50 cm high, noticeably vestite (scape and floral axis, pedicels, bracts and leaves abaxially flocculose; sepals thinly flocculose, the leaves sometimes almost glabrous); scape (3-) 5-7 mm thick; lowermost scape-bracts not leafy, sheathing, with filiform entire or prickly tips; median scape-bracts foliaceous, sometimes deciduous; upper scape-bracts like the floral bracts but narrower and with longer caudae, 3.8-4.5 cm long; raceme 15-20 cm long with 15-26 flowers; floral bracts conspicuous, 1.5-4 cm long; pedicels 9-15 (-30) mm long; sepals 24-30 mm long, the adaxial pair winged or keeled; corolla 4.5-6 cm long. Smith (in Smith & Downs, 1974) cited Gregory & Eiten 113 under the name of Pitcairnia karwinskyana and McVaugh 13091 as P. pteropoda L. B. Smith (Contr. Gray Herb. II. 117: 26. pl. 2, fig. 19. 1937, the holotype from Uruapan, Mich., Holway 3619, GH!). The two specimens, however, are from essentially the same locality and perhaps from the same small stream-valley, and it seems unlikely that they represent different species, though they differ in aspect. The June specimen is noticeably flocculose; the plant bears a young raceme mostly in bud, the paired sepals are provided with a stiff wing 1 mm wide, the floral bracts are about as conspicuous as the flowers. In the September specimen much of the pubescence has been eroded away, the paired sepals bear a thick obtuse keel 0.7 mm high, the open flowers and developing fruits dwarf the bracts. The median scape-bracts are foliaceous in both, but evidently more mature and longer (up to 40 cm vs. 25 cm)- in the September specimen. The lowermost scape-bracts in the June specimen terminate in spiniform aculeate blades, as described for P. pteropoda, but in neither specimen are the flowers visibly secund, as also described for that species, and as in the holotype. The scape-bracts in P. pteropoda are described as "vaginiform, much exceeded by the leaves," thus apparently unlike both the above specimens. I suggest that specific limits are insufficiently known in the group that includes P. karwinskyana, P. pteropoda, P. foliacea, and P. ringens, all of which are reported from our area, and that further field-study of local populations should be used to study variation especially of the sepals (whether consistently winged or keeled), of the scape-bracts (whether or not consistently foliaceous at some levels, and whether or not the lowest ones are consistently spinose-tipped). —See McVaugh 1989
