Close this window.

Fuchsia jimenezii

Distribution: Panama and Costa Rica. Scattered in mostly secondary vegetation of wet evergreen cloud forests from Chiriqui Province of northern Panama to the northernmost extension of Puntarenas Province of Costa Rica, 1,500-1,900 m.

Habit: Scandent subshrub 0.5-1.5(-2) m tall, glabrous throughout. Branchlets 1-5 dm long, 1-3 mm thick, quadrangular; older branches terete, with pale tan, finely fissured bark.

Leaves: Leaves opposite, subcoriaceous, elliptic to lance-elliptic, acute at base, acute to acuminate at apex, (3-)5-11.5 cm long, (1-)2.5-5 cm wide, dark green above, flushed purple beneath; secondary veins 10-12 on either side of the midvein, margin subentire to denticulate with small, glandular teeth; petiole stout, 1-2 mm thick, red, 4-9 mm long; stipules semisucculent, deltoid, dark when dry, 0.8-1.0 mm long and wide, often connate, deciduous.

Flowers: Flowers numerous in terminal racemes, rarely axillary, or occasionally in 2-3-branched panicles, rachis 5-20 cm long, pedicels erect to spreading, slender, 6-12 mm long, elongating up to 18 mm long in fruit, ovary cylindrical-fusiform, 4-6 mm long, ca. 3 mm thick, lustrous red-pink, floral tube obconic to sub cylindric, 2.5-4.5 mm long, 1.5-2.5 mm wide at base, widening to 2.5-4.5 mm wide at rim, sepals broadly lanceolate, 4-6 mm long, 2.5-3.5 mm wide, apex acute, spreading, tube and sepals red to rose-red, petals rose-pink, suborbicular to ovate, 4-6 mm long, 3-4.mm wide, rounded at the base, rounded to acute at the apex, nectary an irregularly to 4-lobed ring-shaped disc' adnate to the base of the floral tube, 1-1.5 mm high, filaments dull red, the antisepalous filaments erect and exserted above the rim of the tube, 1-1.5 mm long, the antipetalous filaments reflexed and included in the tube,ยท0.8-1.4 mm long, anthers white, 1.5-2.0 mm long, 0.9-1.2 mm thick, stylem stout, 6-8 mm long, the stigma capitate and obscurely 4~cleft at the apex, 1-1.5 mm long, ca. 1 mm thick.

Fruit: Berry subglobose, 10-12 mm long, ca. 10 mm thick when ripe, light to dark red, lustrous.

Seeds: Seeds reddish, 0.9-1.2 mm long, 0.5-0.7 mm thick.

Chromosomes: Gametic chromosome number n = 11.

Notes: Flowering throughout the year.

Top

Close this window.