Monograph of Coccinia (Cucurbitaceae)
Author
Holstein, Norbert
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9892-0355
Nees-Institute for Biodiversity of Plants, Meckenheimer Allee 170, 53115 Bonn, Germany
holstein@uni-bonn.de
text
PhytoKeys
2015
2015-08-03
54
1
166
http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/phytokeys.54.3285
journal article
http://dx.doi.org/10.3897/phytokeys.54.3285
1314-2003-54-1
FFE0FFDE6E36FFDA78113F25FF96FFDC
576320
3.
Coccinia barteri (Hook.f.) Keay, Kew Bull. 8: 82. 1953.
Staphylosyce barteri
Hook.f. in Oliv., Fl. trop. Afr. 2: 554. 1871.
Physedra barteri
(Hook.f.) Cogn. in A.DC. & C.DC., Monogr. Phan. 3: 525. 1881.
Coccinia barteri
Type: Nigeria. Nupe [Niger State]: exact locality not specified, male, fl,
C. Barter 1525
(Lectotype, designated by
Jeffrey (1967
: 60): K!, digital image! [K]).
Coccinia barteri
Type: Equatorial Guinea. [Fernando Po] Bioko Island, female,
C. Barter no.
? (Syntype: K?), see Taxonomic remarks.
Coccinia macrocarpa
Cogn., Bull. Jard. Bot.
Etat
Brux. 5: 113. 1915-1919. Pro parte [except
E. Luja 125
].
Coccinia barteri
Type: D. R. Congo. Sankuru river [tributary of Kasai river], no detailed location given, on farmland and in bushland, male, fl, Jul 1904,
E. Luja 205
(Lectotype, designated by
Jeffrey (1967
: 61): BR! [BR0000008888570, digital image: BR, JPS, photo: K!).
Coccinia barteri
Type: Sankuru river [tributary of Kasai river], no detailed location given, female, fr, Nov 1903,
E. Luja 125
(Syntype: BR! [BR0000008888228, digital image: BR, JPS]).
Coccinia subhastata
Keraudren, Fl. Cam. 6: 131. 1967.
Coccinia barteri
Type: Cameroon. South Region: Bitye, male, fl, 1917,
G.L. Bates 1469
(Holotype: BM!).
Description.
Perennial climber. Stems up to 10 m, glabrous or puberulous. Petioles 1-3.5(-8.5) cm, glabrous to puberulous, adaxial side rarely with trichomes. Leaves 3.5-20
x
4-23 cm, cordate, subhastate, shallowly to deeply 3- or 5-lobate. Lobes triangulate, ovate to oblong. Margin entire with few to many teeth to serrate. Apex obtuse to acute, with apical tooth. Upper leaf surface glabrous with clear or white pustules, lower leaf surface glabrous to puberulous on main nerves, esp. towards base, with or without small dark glands. Probracts ovate to elliptical, up to 5 mm long or missing. Tendrils simple or bifid. Male flowers in few- to many-flowered racemes. Common peduncle up to 3-8 mm long, glabrous to puberulous. Pedicel <8 mm, indumentum like peduncle. Flowers without or with up to 1.5 mm long bracts. Perianth tube glabrous to puberulous. Calyx lobes 1-2.5 mm, subulate, lineal, rarely somewhat lanceolate, reflexed, spreading or erect and adpressed to corolla, sometimes seemingly fleshy. Corolla 1.1-2.4 cm, salmon, yellow to orange-yellow, lobes up to 3-10 mm. Filament column, anther head, and pollen sac color not seen. Female flowers in racemes, sometimes accompanied with a solitary flower or one solitary flower only. Peduncles and petioles in racemes like in males. Solitary female flowers with up to 1.5 cm long glabrous to puberulous pedicel. Ovary glabrous. Hypanthium glabrous to puberulous, calyx lobes and corolla as in males. Style not seen. Stigma
shape
not seen, more or less dark yellow. Fruit 1.5-2.5
x
1.5 cm, shortly elliptical to subglobose, unripe green with pale spots, ripe red. Seeds 5.5
x
2.5-3
x
1-1.5 mm (L/W/H), more or less symmetrically obovate, face flat to flatly lenticular.
Phenology.
Flowering time: January-June, August-November.
Distribution.
Fig.
24
. Humid tropical West Africa, Angola (Cabinda, Cuanza Norte), Burundi?, C and S Cameroon, C and S Central African Republic, D. R. Congo, R. Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Mozambique (Manica), S South Sudan?, Uganda (Western, Central), Rwanda?, W Tanzania, Zambia (Northern Province), Zimbabwe (Manicaland). Elevation from sea level to 1650 m. Soil preference not well known, on loam soil, on granite (
J.B. Gillett 15298
). (
Newtonia
) rainforest; forest margins; near open water with
Pandanus candelabrum
,
Oxystigma mannii
, and
Raphia vinifera
; near river with
Saba comorensis
; on border of gallery forest and
Terminalia glaucescens
woodland; in riverine bushes, on river islands with
Alchornea cordifolia
; in fallows.
Figure 24.
Distribution map of
Coccinia barteri
(based on 99 collections).
Use.
The Turumbu people mash young leaves, mixed with white argil, and put the paste onto the heads of ill children (
W. Kesler 1034
).
Vernacular names.
Lissongo [Mbati]: makpo (
C. Tisserant (
Equipe
) 2250
); Twi:
isamaŋ
kyẽkyẽa (
F.R. Irvine 2604
); Turumbu: eliki e litoko (
J. Louis 2253
), ndombo di ilo (
W. Kesler 1034
)
Remarks.
Coccinia barteri
is treated here in a wide sense as it contains several forms (see also
Holstein and Renner 2011b
). This is because data on these forms are scarce and do not unambiguously allow to refer to these as species. Therefore, the present author refrains from creating an intraspecific classification as a phylogeographic treatment and crossing experiments appear to be necessary to clarify this problematic taxon.
There are collections in Gabon that are of intermediate morphology between
Coccinia barteri
and
Coccinia racemiflora
(
M.A. van Bergen 490
(WAG) =
Coccinia barteri
6 in Fig.
17
).
Holstein and Renner (2011b)
suggested that hybridization occurs between these species. Whether the hybrids are fertile or sterile is not known.
Taxonomic remarks.
Coccinia barteri
(Hook.f.) Keay is type species of the genus
Staphylosyce
Hook.f.
Joseph Dalton Hooker mentions collections from Fernando Po [Bioko Island] and Nupe in the protologue of
Coccinia barteri
. He only gives the name of Barter, whose Nupe specimen is in K, but there are no
Coccinia
specimens by Barter from Fernando Po. However, there are two specimens collected by G. Mann (
Mann N199
! and
N1166
!) in
Hooker's
herbarium (now in K). These were collected on that island, and they contain drawings that were most likely the basis for
Hooker's
description of
Staphylosyce barteri
. Possibly, Hooker mistakenly left out
Mann's
name in the protologue, whose collections contain many type specimens (
Hooker 1871
).
Keay published in error
Coccinea barteri
[
sic
] in his new combination, but accepted the species as belonging to
Coccinia
in Hutchinson and
Dalziel's
Flora of Tropical Africa (1954).
The syntypes of
Coccinia macrocarpa
certainly belong to different taxa. The present author concurs with
Keraudren
, who placed the male specimen
E
. Luja 205
into the polymorphic
Coccinia barteri
(1967). However, the female plant
E
. Luja 125
is clearly not part of
Coccinia
.
Coccinia
seeds are up to 7 mm long, at the base attenuate to trun
cate
and with a rounded apex. In contrast, the seeds of
E
. Luja 125
are subquadratic as Jeffrey already pointed out on the type specimen. A placement in
Momordica
by Jeffrey (on the sheet) seems to be correct, whether this is
Momordica multiflora
Hook.f. (1871) as identified by Jeffrey or
Momordica parvifolia
Cogn. (1916) as identified by
Keraudren
is beyond the present author's knowledge.
Coccinia subhastata
was described under the assumption that
Coccinia barteri
has long calyx lobes, as it can be seen in Flore du Cameroun (
Keraudren
1967
). Monique
Keraudren
in her research on western Central African
Cucurbitaceae
(
Keraudren-Aymonin
1975a
;
Keraudren
1967
) treated
Coccinia
/
Physedra barteri
and
Physedra heterophylla
as synonymous. However, she confused the long subulate calyx lobes of
Physedra heterophylla
as a character for
Coccinia barteri
, describing a specimen with short calyx lobes and flowers in long racemes as a new species,
Coccinia subhastata
Keraudren. She also described several differences of
Coccinia subhastata
to
Coccinia barteri
, which are not supported when carefully examined.
Coccinia subhastata
should only have simple tendrils, but the holotype of
Coccinia subhastata
also has a bifid tendril. Furthermore, the
Coccinia barteri
lectotype
C. Barter 1525
has a subhastate leaf and simple tendrils. The description of
Coccinia subhastata
thus is thus wrong and the species is a synonym of
Coccinia barteri
, as it has been pointed out by
Holstein and Renner (2010)
. In addition to the confusion of
Coccinia heterophylla
and
Coccinia barteri
,
Keraudren
separated the western Central African specimens with few-flowered racemes as
Coccinia keayana
R.Fern. (
Keraudren
1967
).
Coccinia keayana
, however, does in fact not occur in this region but only in West Africa, and her
Coccinia keayana
specimens from Cameroon belong to the polymorphic
Coccinia barteri
.
Specimens examined.
(Selection, in total: 153) Angola. Cuanza Norte: Cazengo municipality, near Agricultural Station Cazengo,
J. Gossweiler 5492
(COI, LISU), and
5507
(LISU). Benin. Atlantique: Allada commune, Dahounkpa (Niaouli),
6°44'N
,
2°07'E
,
A.
Akoegninou
& F. Bada 2992
(WAG [WAG0314946]). Cameroon. South Region: Bipinde [Bipindi],
G.A. Zenker 1657
(E, G (4), HBG, P [P05621189], P [P05621192], W, Z). Central African Republic. Lobaye: Boukoko,
C. Tisserant (
Equipe
) 2176
(BM, P [P05620598], P [P05621175]). D. R. Congo. Katanga: [Haut Katanga district], 40 km on road from Lubumbashi to Sakanja,
A. Schmitz 4465
(EA (2), WAG [WAG0225507], WAG [WAG0225508]). Equatorial Guinea. Bioko Norte: Malabo-Punta Hermosa km 9, 32NMK8114,
F.J.
Fernandez
Casas 12077
(BM, MA n.v., MO, WAG [WAG0069018]). Gabon.
Haut-Ogooue
: 21 km on road from Okonja to
Akieni
,
0°45.84'S
,
13°47.01'E
,
J.J. Wieringa et al. 6387
(M, WAG [WAG0250956], WAG [WAG0250957], WAG [WAG0250958]). Ghana. Volta: Agumatsa Wildlife Sanctuary, at town Wli-Agorviefe, W of Park Guard HQ,
7°06'46"N
,
0°35'25"E
,
H.H. Schmidt et al. 2192
(K, MO). Guinea.
Nzerekore
: [Beyla
prefecture
], Bola [Boola], Famondou [Famodougou],
8.48068°N
8.70129°W
,
E. Achigan-Dako 07 NIA 899
(GAT (3)). Ivory Coast. Lagunes: Abidjan, Banco Forest Reserve, in marshy valley, near the entrance,
J. de Koning 6144B
(WAG [WAG0099439]). Nigeria. Rivers: Old GRA [Government reservation area], Port Harcourt,
B.E. Okoli 150
(IFE (cited and picture of plant in
Okoli 1984
)). R. Congo. Sangha: 36.89 km E-SE Bomassa,
2°11.85'N
,
16°31.10'E
,
S.T. Ndolo Ebika 401
(E [E00486113]). Sierra Leone. Kono: Tingi Mts, top of E ridge,
J.K. Morton & D. Gledhill SL1886
(WAG [WAG0225480], WAG [WAG0225481]). Tanzania. Kigoma: Kigoma Rural District, Gombe Stream National Park, Mitumba Valley, research staff houses,
4°39'11"S
,
29°38'09"E
,
G. Gobbo et al. 471
(MO). Zimbabwe. Manicaland: Chirinda Forest,
B. Goldsmith 39/62
(COI, K, NY).