MONSTERA GUZMANJACOBIAE
PROTOLOGUE: Monstera guzmanjacobiae Diaz Jim., M.Cedeño, Zuluaga & Aguilar-Rodr., published in Phytotaxa 437: 41 (2020).
Monstera guzmanjacobiae Díaz Jiménez, M.Cedeño, Zuluaga & Aguilar-Rodríguez, sp. nov. Type: MEXICO. Veracruz: Municipio Catemaco, La Palma, Selva alta perennifolia, 18º33’21’’N, 95º03’35’’W, 56 m, 31 May 2014, Pedro Díaz Jiménez & Valeria Guzmán Jacob 1305 (holotype XAL!, isotypes, MEXU!, UJAT!).
DISTRIBUTION: Mexico (Veracruz), Costa Rica: Costa Rica, Mexico Gulf, Veracruz.
DISTRIBUTION NOTE: Mexico: Veracruz.
SPECIES DESCRIPTION:
Nomadic vine, appressed-climbing with pendent branches. Seedlings: filiform. Juvenile plants: root climbers; stems smooth, light-green, dorsiventrally compressed; internodes 4–8 cm long, 3–5 mm diam.; petiole inconspicuous, 1.0–2.5 cm long; blades obovate, cordate at base, short-acuminate at apex, coriaceous, 6–9 × 5–8 cm, occasionally white spotted, completely appressed to the phorophyte; fenestrations absent. Adult plants: root climbers; stems dark green, scaly or with a light brown, thin and exfoliating epidermis, sometimes semiglossy, slightly with greenish pustules, rarely smooth, sulcate on one side; internodes 6–12 cm long, 0.8–2.5 cm diam., 4.8–7.5 times longer than wide; cataphylls deciduous; anchor roots brown; feeder roots beige and corky, up to 35 cm long; petiole matte-green, glaucous towards base, smooth towards the geniculum, striated at base, scarcely white-spotted, 15–25(30) cm long, sheathed up to 1.5 cm before or to base of the geniculum; petiole sheath marcescent with fibrous fragments, apically prolonged as a ligule 1.5–3.0 cm long; geniculum light or dark green, smooth or striated, terete, 0.5–3.5 cm long, 0.4–1.0 cm diam.; blades chartaceous to subcoriaceous, ovate to broadly elliptic, cordate to semicordate at base, acute or acuminate at apex, 18–59 × 15–37(40) cm, dark green, glossy above and bright light green below, drying light brown above and dull green below; perforations absent or present, 1–4 per side, oblong-elliptic, generally arranged in one side; margins entire; midrib sunken adaxially, prominent abaxially, primary lateral veins 5–9 per side, whitish and prominent abaxially, departing midrib at 65–70°; secondary veins parallel and joined near the medial part of the blade to the margin.⁴
INFLORESCENCE:
Inflorescences curved or rarely erect, at an angle of 40–60°, on ascending or pendent stems, arranged in the axils of the leaves or into cataphylls; peduncle green or yellowish, smooth towards the apex, with greenish-white pustules at base, 5–20 cm long, 0.8–2.0 cm diam.; spathe obtuse or mucronate, light green or yellowish green during development, white to creamy internally and green-yellowish or yellowish externally at anthesis, cucullate, coriaceous, 15–19 × 12–15 cm, marcescent after anthesis, without enveloping the spadix, up to 1 cm longer than the spadix; spadix white during development, white-creamy at anthesis, 8–16 cm long, 2–4 cm diam., with a sterile flowered slender region towards base; basal sterile flowers with a transparent stigmatic secretion, 4–6 mm long; fertile flowers 5–7 mm long; stamens 1–6 mm long, with laminar filaments; anthers 1.5–2 mm long; ovary quadrangular in longitudinal section, ribbed, 4–5 × 3.5–4.0 mm; style pyramidal and conical, 3.5–4.0 × 2.5–3.5 mm; stigma linear, with a yellowish stigmatic secretion; berries with a green stylar cap during development, mature stylar cap yellowish-green; pulp white; seeds pale yellow and brown, ovate-oblong, 6–9 × 5–7 mm; strophiole thick, yellow.⁴
ECOLOGY:
It is known from the municipality of Catemaco between La Palma and the road between Tebanca and Miguel Hidalgo, at 400 m, in a Tropical wet forest life zone. Flowering and fruiting was recorded in February, March, April, May, June and November.⁴
DISTRIBUTION MAPS:
ETYMOLOGY:
The species is named in honor of Mexican biologist Valeria Guzmán Jacob from the Göttingen University, who helped to collect the type specimen.²
NOTES:
1. The species is member of sect. Marcgraviopsis and is characterized by the ligule of the petiole sheath 1.5–3.0 cm in length, the adult plant’s leaf blade with fenestrations (1–4 perforations) often only on one side or lacking fenestrations, the inflorescence erect or inclined, the flowers with a conical pyramidal style, the seeds with a yellowish color and with a thick yellow strophiole. Monstera guzmanjacobiae is similar to Monstera luteynii but this is endemic from Costa Rica and has non-fenestrate blades and flowers with truncate style. It could also be confused with Monstera tuberculata, because both have pendent habit, although the latter has leaf blades two to three times smaller, rarely fenestrate, and the inflorescences are completely pendent (inclined between 40–60° and rarely erect in Monstera guzmanjacobiae). Adult plants of Monstera guzmanjacobiae have leaf blades similar to those of pre-adult plants of Monstera punctulata. However, in this latter species, the fenestrations have varied sizes and some reach the edge of the blades.⁴
STORY:
STORY TITLE: A bee at the door, ants at the fruit
Monstera guzmanjacobiae is one of the few species in the genus whose flowering has been watched from opening to close. At anthesis the spathe inflates and a narrow opening forms where its edge peels away; at the base a second entrance appears when a small hole opens.² At the same time the stigmas of the sterile flowers secrete a sticky transparent resin and give off a strong fruity odor, likened to ripe melon, and the stigmas of the fertile flowers become receptive as they secrete a clear to faintly yellow fluid.² Over the following hours or days the spathe goes on inflating and widening its opening; before anthesis ends the stigmas wither, the anthers emerge and shed pollen, and the spathe opens completely.²
Inside the chamber were nitidulid beetles and drosophilid flies; outside, male euglossine bees of the genus Euglossa flew and walked over the spathe but did not enter.² On the pattern of the two field studies made elsewhere in the genus, the beetles and flies are the likely pollinators.² Once the fruits ripen, large numbers of Acromyrmex ants visit the infructescence, apparently to feed on the white pulp around the seeds.²
The species is endemic to Los Tuxtlas in Veracruz and is named for the Mexican biologist Valeria Guzmán Jacob, who helped collect the type.² It hangs from its host like Monstera tuberculata, but its blades are two to three times larger and its inflorescences are inclined rather than fully pendent.⁴
REFERENCES:
1. Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew — Monstera guzmanjacobiae Diaz Jim., M.Cedeño, Zuluaga & Aguilar-Rodr.
2. Phytotaxa 437: 41 (2020) — protologue.
3. iNaturalist: Monstera guzmanjacobiae
Additional photos from iNaturalist by Valentina Sandoval Granillo, Lynne Correia, Vera SD and Héctor-Gómez