MONSTERA TUBERCULATA
PROTOLOGUE: Monstera tuberculata Lundell, published in Lloydia 2: 78 (1939). The protologue is reproduced below.
DISTRIBUTION: S. Mexico to C. America: Belize, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico Gulf, Mexico Southeast, Mexico Southwest, Nicaragua, Panama.
DISTRIBUTION NOTE: Belize: Cayo Mexico: Oaxaca iNaturalist: Alajuela, Bocas del Toro, Chiapas, Heredia, Limón, Tabasco, Toledo, Veracruz.
SPECIES DESCRIPTION:
Nomadic vine, pendent habit. Seedlings: filiform. Juvenile plants: root climbers; stems light-green to dark, smooth, flattened; internodes 3–6 cm long, 3–5 mm diam.; petiole not visible, dark green, smooth, 3–6 cm long; blades obovate or orbicular, subcordate to truncate at base, acuminate at apex, coriaceous, variegated, 5–10 × 4–9 cm, appressed to the phorophyte; fenestrations absent. Adult plants: root climbers; stems dark-green to light- green, smooth, cylindrical or dorsoventrally compressed and slightly sulcate on one side, with caducous epidermis; internodes 5–15 cm long, 1–2 cm diam., 5.0–7.5 times longer than wide; anchor roots dark-brown; feeder roots corky; petiole light or dark-green, smooth, 2–6 cm long, sheathed to base of the geniculum, the sheath apically prolonged in a free ligule, 3–6 cm long; petiole sheath dry-persistent for several days, leaving fibrous residues; geniculum smooth, flattened adaxially, convex abaxially, 5–10 mm long; blades ovate, cordulate to cordate at base, obtuse to short-acuminate at apex, coriaceous, drying blackish, yellowish or grayish, 5.5–20.0 × 4–12 cm, 1.4–1.9 times longer than wide, not decurrent on the geniculum; midrib convex on both surfaces, drying blackish abaxially, primary lateral veins 4–7 per side, obscure adaxially, prominent abaxially, drying yellowish or blackish; secondary veins reticulate and prominent, wavy throughout its length when dry; collective veins slightly visible; fenestrations absent or rarely present; margins entire.⁴
INFLORESCENCE:
Inflorescences on pendent stems, 1–10 simultaneously at flowering time, arranged in the leaf axils; peduncle smooth, 2–5 cm long, 2–6 mm diam.; spathe acuminate to long-acuminate, green externally during development, yellowish green or creamy white externally and white internally at anthesis, marcescent or deciduous after anthesis, 7–10 × 6–8 cm, up to 3 cm longer than the spadix; spadix white during development, yellow at anthesis, 4–7 cm long, 1.5–3.5 cm diam.; basal sterile flowers 4–6 mm long, with a yellowish stigmatic secretion; fertile flowers 5–9 mm long; stamens 1–5 mm long, with laminar filaments; anthers 1.5–2.0 mm long; ovary acute at base, ribbed, 3–5 × 2–3 mm; style pentagonal or hexagonal, 5–6 × 3.5–5.0 mm; stigmaphore thickly conical and recurved, 3–6 mm long; stigma linear, with a rusty red stigmatic secretion; berries with a yellowish-green stylar cap during development, mature stylar cap dark-green; pulp white; seeds brown with white dots, oblong, 6–9 mm long.⁴
ECOLOGY:
From México (Oaxaca) to West of Panamá, at 0‒1100 m. It lives in Tropical moist forest and Tropical wet forest life zones; primary and secondary forest. Flowering has been recorded in February, April, June-July and November. Fruit in May-August.⁴
ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin tuberculatus, "bearing small warts," referring to the spadix, which the conical styles of the pistils give a tuberculate appearance.
NOTES:
1. The species, a member of sect. Echinospadix, is characterized by its silvery blotched juvenile leaves, appressed-climbing high growing adult plants with the flowering branches pendent, elongated internodes, short petioles with a ligule that may extend beyond base of the blade, the broadly ovate, usually subcordate acuminate blades with a short peduncle, spathe about as broad as long and white cylindroid spadix. The two areas have two distinct varieties: Monstera tuberculata var. tuberculata in Mexico and Guatemala is known from elevations of 50–150 m and Monstera tuberculata var. brevinoda in Nicaragua to Panama ranges from 0–150 m. Monstera tuberculata var. tuberculata in Belize (Brewer 7635, MO), have adult leaf blades with abundant impressed glands on the underside, and in Mexico, in the region of Veracruz (Ceja et al. 1881, XAL) they present leaves with a few fenestrations, a characteristic never observed in the populations of Costa Rica and Panama (Cedeño-Fonseca et al. 2022).⁴
2. Conservation status: Monstera tuberculata is protected in the Estación Biológica La Selva, Estación Biológica La Tirimbina, Refugio de Vida Silvestre Mixto Gandoca-Manzanillo and Parque Nacional Braulio Carrillo.⁵
3. As a juvenile in cultivation Monstera tuberculata shingles like Monstera dubia but has thinner leaves with cloudy blotches rather than white veins, and is frequently all green; the adult leaves keep the same shape, only larger, thicker and unmarked.⁷ It is one of the monsteroids that flowers while still in its juvenile leaf form, though on flowering plants the leaves are considerably larger and the inflorescences are carried clear of them.⁸
REFERENCES:
1. Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew — Monstera tuberculata Lundell
2. Lloydia 2: 78 (1939) — protologue.
3. iNaturalist: Monstera tuberculata
7. Boyce 2000. Juvenile monsteroids. Aroid-L, 12 June 2000
8. Boyce 2000. Flowering juveniles. Aroid-L, 15 June 2000
Additional photos by David Scherberich
Additional photos from iNaturalist by Yerlin Tenorio, marie1971, Isaias Morataya, Morgan Hook, radinis, Morgan Hay, frogman44, La Mano del Mono, meghanmanary, Carolyn Cox, Heiner Ziegler, jane_sch98 and ldavis1229
Additional photos from Wikimedia Commons by csparr, Isaac Larkin and Martín Sánchez Vilchis
