SCINDAPSUS CAROLINENSIS

PROTOLOGUE: Scindapsus carolinensis , published in Journal of Japanese Botany 13: 194 (1937).

Scindapsus carolinensis Hosok., sp. nov. Type: Caroline Islands, Truk (Chuuk), on rocky sea-shore at Amatyan on the island of Tol, 26 July 1936, T. Hosokawa 8308 (type in Herb. Taihoku Imperial University).

SYNONYMS:

OTHER NAMES: Appuap (Chuuk)

DISTRIBUTION: Caroline Is. (Chuuk): Caroline Is..

DISTRIBUTION NOTE: POWO: Caroline Is. (Chuuk).

SPECIES DESCRIPTION:

Translated from protologue: A plant climbing high on trees or creeping on tree trunks or rocks. Internodes of the stem about 2 cm long and 1 cm thick. Petiole about 31 cm long, sheathed, 4 cm long above the sheath, geniculate at the apex. Blade obliquely oblong-ovate, entire, apex acuminate, base obtuse, about 35 cm long and 15 cm wide, glabrous on both surfaces, with numerous slender lateral veins spreading from the midrib at an angle of about 65°, parallel, ascending in an arc toward the margin.²

INFLORESCENCE:

Translated from protologue: Peduncle about 7 cm long. Spathe thick and fleshy, glabrous, about 20 cm long, acute. Spadix sessile in flower, cylindric, about 15 cm long and 1.5 cm thick, slightly tapered upward, apex acute. Stamens 4, with rather broad, very short filaments and two-celled anthers 2 mm long. Pistils subprismatic, 5 mm long, the apex hexagonal or pentagonal, crowned by an oblong, slightly raised stigma. Ovary one-celled, one-ovuled; ovule anatropous, attached to the bottom of the cavity by a short funicle.²

ECOLOGY:

Found on a rocky sea-shore at Amatyan on Tol Island, Chuuk, climbing high on trees or creeping over trunks and rocks; Hosokawa also saw it on the islets of Wara, Fefan and Trowasi, on Trowasi at upper altitudes on Calophyllum inophyllum.²

ETYMOLOGY:

Of the Caroline Islands, the Micronesian archipelago to which Chuuk, the type locality, belongs; Hosokawa noted that the genus was new to Micronesia.²

NOTES:

1. Hosokawa recorded that the genus was new to Micronesia and gave the Chuukese vernacular name Appuap; in Chuuk the plant also grows on the islets of Wara, Fefan and Trowasi, and his figure shows it climbing a Calophyllum inophyllum at upper altitudes on Trowasi.²

2. Boyce and Wong list the species among those described after Engler and Krause's monograph of 1908, the last revision of the genus, and note that there is no modern account of Scindapsus and that many of its species are known only from fragmentary collections.³

STORY:

STORY TITLE: The only Scindapsus in Micronesia

On July 26th, 1936, Takahide Hosokawa collected a climbing aroid on a rocky sea-shore at Amatyan on Tol, one of the islands of Truk lagoon, now Chuuk. He described it the following year as Scindapsus carolinensis, a plant climbing high on trees or creeping over trunks and rocks, with obliquely oblong-ovate blades about 35 cm long on petioles 31 cm long, a thick fleshy spathe about 20 cm long and a sessile spadix 15 cm long; the pistils have a single ovule attached at the bottom of the cavity, which settles the genus. The photograph in the paper shows it climbing a Calophyllum inophyllum at upper altitudes on the islet of Trowasi, and Hosokawa added that it also grows on the islets of Wara and Fefan and that the Chuukese call it Appuap.²

Hosokawa noted that the genus was new to Micronesia, and his Japanese commentary sets the find in its place: Scindapsus is rich in the Sunda-land of Borneo, the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra, comparatively poor toward New Guinea, and had never been known from Micronesia before. The species remains the genus's only record there, endemic to Chuuk by the account of Plants of the World Online. The Compendium of Malesian aroid genera lists it among the species described since the 1908 monograph and left without a modern treatment.²,³

REFERENCES:

1. Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew — Scindapsus carolinensis

2. Journal of Japanese Botany 13: 194 (1937) — protologue.

3. Boyce & Wong 2015. Compendium Genera Aracearum Malesianum. Aroideana 38E(1): 40–177