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Strophanthus petersianus [family APOCYNACEAE]

Date Updated: 19 August 2007

Herbarium
South African National Biodiversity Institute, Compton Herbarium, Cape Town (SAM)
Collection
Flora of Southern Africa
Resource Type
Reference Sources
Entry From
Flora of South Africa, (2003) Author: Dr J.P. Roux
Names
Strophanthus petersianus [family APOCYNACEAE]
Common names
S. petersianus var. grandiflorus N. E. Br. in Kew Bull. 1892: 126 (1892), partly, as to the Monteiro specimen from Delagoa Bay (K). S. grandiflorus (N. E. Br.) Gilg in Bot. Jahrb. 32: 161 (1902), partly; Stapf in F.C. 4, 1: 510 (1907).
Information
Shrub, often scandent, much branched, glabrous; branches slender; bark brown, lenticellate, becoming greyish with age. Leaves ovate to elliptic-oblong, 3-8 (rarely to 11) cm long and 1-5-4 cm broad, base acute to obtuse, apex acute to acuminate; secondary nerves 6-9 on each side, often indistinct; petiole 6-10 mm long; axillary glands present. Inflorescence terminal, 1-3-flowered, appearing with the young leaves, glabrous; bracts linear-lanceolate, 6-9 mm long; pedicels 4-7 mm long. Flowers whitish to cream within the tube and on the inner side of the lobes, reddish purple without. Calyx glabrous, 1-1-5 cm long; sepals lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, acute to subacuminate, erect, with two tooth-like glands at the base of each sepal. Corolla glabrous without, puberulous within; tube cylindrical at the base for 4-6 mm, then broadly funnel-shaped for 1-2 cm; lobes produced into long, slender, pendulous, spirally twisted appendages 6-14 cm long; throat scales subulate 5-8 mm long. Stamens included; filaments 2-5-4 mm long, pubescent on the inner surface; anthers pollini-ferous in the upper half, lanceolate, 5-6 mm long, sagittate, acuminate with a subulate apiculus 1 mm long. Ovary of 2 free carpels, glabrous; style 6-10 mm long; stigma enclosed by the anthers, capitate with a reflexed frill at the base. Fruit of 2 follicular mericarps eventually spreading at 180°; follicles 20-30 cm long and 3-4 cm broad near the base, tapering gradually to 1 cm broad at the blunt apex, brown, smooth. Seeds oblong, acute, 10-12 mm long, finely tomentose, light brown; awn plumose, 9-12 cm long, with a naked stalk 3-4 cm long; cotyledons broadly elliptic; endosperm scanty; radicle 3 mm long.
Habitat
S. petersianus varies a good deal in size of leaf and flower, and in stature. On the sand dunes near Delagoa Bay it is a much-branched shrub with slender straggling branches and usually large leaves and flowers; this is the form described as S. petersianus var. grandiflorus N. E. Br., but there is a range of variation linking it with the typical, inland form occurring in dry woodland, which has smaller leaves and flowers. Gerstner 6578, which lacks flowers, is described as a liane of 13-17 m. This specimen has oblong-elliptic, acuminate leaves up to 11 cm long; the fruit accompanying the specimen appears to be identical with S. petersianus, however, and so the specimen is included here.
Use
2. Strophanthus petersianus Klotzsch in Peters, Reise Mossamb. Bot. 276 (1861); StapfinF.T.A.4, 1: 182(1902); Codd, Bot. Surv. S. Afr. Mem. 26: 158(1951). Type: Portuguese East Africa, Tete, Peters s.n.
Range
Found in lowveld woodland, usually on dry rocky situations but also on coastal sand dunes and in coastal scrub forest, in north-eastern Transvaal and northern Zululand. The main distribution of the species is in Portuguese East Africa and Rhodesia.
Strophanthus petersianus [family APOCYNACEAE]
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