BROMELIACEAE.Ý In just under the wire for our monocot volumes is Tillandsia elongata Kunth, widespread from Mexico to Peru, Brasil, and the Antilles, but never yet collected in Costa Rica.Ý That is, not until it was found by Manual Bromeliaceae contributor Francisco Morales (INB) along the RÌo Sapo·, near PeÒas Blancas, hard up against the Nicaraguan border.Ý Chicoís material corresponds to T. e. var. subimbricata (Baker) L. B. Sm., virtually as widespread as the sp.
CYPERACEAE.Ý GÛmez-Laurito 10855, from near Los Chiles on the northernmost Atlantic coastal plain, has been determined by family specialist Konraed Camelbeke (GENT) as Scleria lacustris C. Wright.Ý The collector (also a Cyperaceae specialist) subsequently confirmed this identification from a photo of the type.Ý As far as we can determine, S. lacustris is (or was?) a Cuban endemic, though it has become sporadically naturalized in other tropical and subtropical regions.
HALORAGACEAE.Ý This
is more of an update than a true ìleap.îÝ
Previously [see The Cutting Edge 8(2): 5, Apr. 2001], we reported that Jorge GÛmez-Laurito (USJ) had collected
a sp. of Myriophyllum, ìprobably M. aquaticum (Vell.) Verdc.,î from near
El Empalme on the way up to Cerro de La Muerte.Ý We speculated that this might be a new genus and even a new
family for the country.Ý Manual aquatic
plants contributor Garrett THE CUTTING
EDGE
Volume IX, Number 2,
April 2002
NEWS AND
NOTES I TREATMENTS I LEAPS AND BOUNDS I GERMANE
LITERATURE I SEASON'S PICK I
Crow (NHA) recently sent us a scanned image of Crow 6136 (NHA), a 1984 collection of M. aquaticum from a roadside ditch near Santo Domingo de Heredia (this was in the days before INBio).Ý He also suggests that Jorgeís collection may instead represent Myriophyllum quitense Kunth, a sp. of higher elevations.Ý If so, then we would have a new record after all.
PHYTOLACCACEAE.Ý Phytolacca meziana H. Walter has been considered a sp. of northern Mesoamerica, and was not included in William Burgerís 1983 Flora costaricensis treatment of Phytolaccaceae (Fieldiana, Bot. n. s., 13: 199ñ212).Ý Nonetheless, according to recent studies by Francisco Morales, it is present on both slopes of the Cordillera de Talamanca at 2000ñ3150 m elevation.Ý Checking TROPICOS, we learn to our surprise that MO savant Ron Liesner has been applying this name to material from Costa Rica and western Panama since at least 1996, and that the sp. had been collected in Costa Rica as early as 1967 (by present MO Director Peter H. Raven).Ý Phytolacca meziana is distinctive in its long-pedicellate fruits with a persistent calyx.