Pauridia alba (Thunb.) Snijman & Kocyan (2013: 24)

Snijman, Deirdre A., 2014, A taxonomic revision of the genus Pauridia (Hypoxidaceae) in southern Africa, Phytotaxa 182 (1), pp. 1-114 : 62-64

17. Pauridia alba (Thunb.) Snijman & Kocyan (2013: 24) . Fig. 28

Bas.:— Fabricia alba Thunberg (1779: 26) (excluding var. 1 Thunberg 1779: 27) ≡ Hypoxis alba (Thunb.) Linnaeus (1782: 198) ≡ Spiloxene alba (Thunb.) Fourcade (1932: 76) . Type (lectotype designated by Snijman & Kocyan 2013: 24):— SOUTH AFRICA. [Western Cape], Promontorii Bonae Spei, Thunberg s.n. (UPS-THUNB! No. 8248 [image])

= Hypoxis pumila Lamarck (1789: 184) . Type (lectotype designated by Snijman & Kocyan 2013: 24):— SOUTH AFRICA. [Cape] Cap de Bonne-espérance, Lamarck s.n. (P! No. P00562768 [image], solitary-flowered specimen on right hand side of sheet)

= Hypoxis dubia Schultes & Schultes (1830: 775) , syn. nov. Type (lectotype designated here):— SOUTH AFRICA. [Western Cape], Paramont. [Prom.] b. spei, Brehm (M! [image]). This specimen, although poor, has been annotated as ‘ Hypoxis dubia’ by Schultes f.

= Hypoxis alba var. burkei Baker (1878: 102) , syn. nov. [ Hypoxis alba γ Thunberg (1823: 304) ]. Type (lectotype designated here):— SOUTH AFRICA. [Western Cape], Promontorii Bonae Spei, Thunberg s.n. (UPS-THUNB! No. 8249 [image]). Sheet 8249 from Thunberg’s collection in UPS, marked ‘ Hypoxis alba γ’, is chosen to apply the concept of “ Hypoxis alba γ Thunb. ” which is referred to in Baker’s protologue ( Baker 1878)

Plants 3–19 cm tall. Corm depressed-globose, 10–20 mm diam., almost naked basally, otherwise covered with dark brown, leathery tunics, usually splitting into fibres, old corms persisting more or less laterally; fibres nearly unbranched, brown, fine, extended into a loose neck; roots fleshy, arising near corm base; slender runners occasionally present. Cataphylls up to 35 mm long, thin-textured, pinkish green, oblique distally, apex obtuse. Leaves up to 5, often immature at early flowering, sheathing proximally, erect, linear, up to 200 × 3 mm, hemiterete to bluntly trigonous in cross section, occasionally with a few minute teeth distally, apex acute; mesophyll spongy, mostly aerenchymatous. Inflorescences 1 or 2(–5) in flower at a time, (1)2-flowered, mostly longer than leaves; scape hidden in fibrous neck or shortly exserted, up to 40 × 1.5 mm, compressed adaxially, green to reddish; bracts 2, rarely only 1 evident, suberect to spreading, clasping pedicels at base, narrowly lanceolate, canaliculate, 15–35 × 1–4 mm, green to pink, edges membranous, apex acute, rarely with a few membranous teeth. Flowers pedicellate, rotate, white, rarely cream with yellow centre or plain yellow, backed with pale pink and streaked dark pink on outer tepals, often faintly sweet-scented; pedicels erect at anthesis, descending later, 12–45(–75) mm long, reddish; tepals arising from a long, slender, ovary beak, oblong-lanceolate, 7–13(–18) mm long, outer 3.5–6.0 mm wide, mucronate, inner 2.5–5.0 mm wide. Stamens 6, biseriate, more or less spreading, yellow; filaments inserted on ovary beak close to tepals, outer 1.5–3.0 mm long, inner 3.0– 3.5 mm long, both whorls shorter than anthers; anthers narrowly oblong, latrorse, 3–5 mm long, basal lobes up to 0.7 mm long, sometimes diverging, apex emarginate; pollen yellow. Ovary subcylindrical, 5–15(–20) × 5–15(–20) mm, 3-locular, often incompletely so after anthesis, reddish or green with a few longitudinal red stripes, ovary beak slender, 2.0–8.0(–19) mm long; style 0.5–2.5 mm long; stigma branches erect, oblong, 2.5–5.5(–6.0) mm long, often with short, descending lobes at base, shorter than to equalling stamens, yellow, densely papillose. Capsules somewhat procumbent, narrowly fusiform to subcylindrical, 8–15 × ca. 2 mm, beaked for up to 8.0(–19.0) mm, walls splitting open lengthwise close to septa. Seeds ovoid, 0.5 × 0.4 mm, shiny black; testa cells conspicuously colliculate, in ca. 32 longitudinal rows, each conical projection on outer periclinal cell wall surrounded by a broad, flat, isodiametric rim. Flowering period: late April–June.

Distribution and habitat:—This Western Cape species ranges from the Kouebokkeveld, north of Ceres, to the Cape Peninsula in the south and the foothills of the Riviersonderend Mountains near Villiersdorp and the Bot River Lagoon near Kleinmond in the east ( Fig. 27B ). Populations, comprising a few, scattered plants, are restricted to seasonally damp sites in heavy, clay soils within remnant patches of renosterveld and in sandy loam-rich soils amongst alluvium fynbos. Historical records show that many lowland habitats, where the species was once abundant, have been transformed into agricultural land and housing. Due to the fragmented nature of the habitats Pauridia alba has been categorized according to IUCN criteria as Vulnerable ( Raimondo et al. 2009).

Diagnostic features:— Pauridia alba is most closely related to P. aquatica , a widespread species in the Greater Cape Floristic Region. Shared features are the somewhat spongy-textured, subterete leaves, comprising aerenchymatous mesophyll, and white flowers with a more or less cylindrical ovary. Characteristic of P. alba is a prominent ovary beak which is easily seen in dried specimens as a distinct constriction between the ovary and perigone. Like other autumn flowering species in the Cape, the inflorescence develops in advance of the leaves but coincides with the emergence of several prominent, sheathing cataphylls which form a somewhat loose neck of mostly unbranched, fine, brown fibres. The protologue of Hypoxis dubia , placed into synonymy here, clearly states that the scape exceeds the leaves. In contrast, P. aquatica has well-developed leaves when flowering in spring, by which time the cataphylls have withered and a sheathing neck is formed only by the leaf bases, which taper upwards into subterete blades. In P. aquatica the inflorescence invariably remains shorter than the leaves and is mostly more than two-flowered. Moreover, the flowers have a nearly beakless ovary.

As the name suggests, most plants of P. alba have white flowers. Nevertheless, several populations of yellowflowered individuals are known from some areas between Tulbagh and Wellington. Florally these resemble P. umbraticola , from the Olifants River Valley which has distinctive carinate, pale green leaves with translucent veins.

Early herbarium collections of P. alba have often been misidentified as P. affinis since both have succulent, somewhat terete leaves which are mostly immature at the start of flowering and the flowers are flushed pink or red dorsally. P. alba can be distinguished by its somewhat horizontally growing corms which are naked at the base but covered above by a loose, tuft of fine, unbranched, brown fibres. P. affinis on the other hand has vertically growing corms covered by hard, dark fibrous ribs that are firmly attached to the basal disc. In addition, the somewhat thicktextured, yellow flowers have a beakless ovary.

Discussion:—Several morphological variants exist in particular parts of the geographic range. Throughout most areas the flowers are white above and backed with pink. Populations from the Wellington area, however, occasionally have yellow or less frequently cream flowers, all of which are consistently pink below. Specimens from the Darling, Kalabaskraal, Tulbagh and Wellington areas have minutely toothed leaves, an attribute rarely found in populations elsewhere. Possibly the most unusual variants have been recorded from the Kouebokkeveld, north of Ceres, and the Villiersdorp and Kleinmond areas in the southeast. Unlike the majority of collections in which the ovary is considerably longer than the apical beak, these have an ovary up to three times shorter than the ovary beak. The total length of the ovary plus beak, however, is much the same for all the specimens: 10–26 mm long for typical P. alba and 18.0– 20.5 mm for the specimens from the Kouebokkeveld and near Villiersdorp and Kleinmond.

Additional specimens examined:— SOUTH AFRICA. Western Cape: Witklip, near farm house (QDS: 3217 DD), 7 June 1965, Thompson 90 ( NBG!); Skoongesig , Ceres (QDS: 3219 CC), 15 May 1970, Hanekom 1367 ( NBG!, PRE!); Versveld Nature Reserve , Darling (QDS: 3318 AD), 4 June 1971, Axelson 437 ( NBG!); 4 miles [6.4 km] Nof Malmesbury (QDS: 3318 BC), May 1940, Steytler s.n. ( NBG 64959!); Rondebosch Common (QDS: 3318 CD), 24 June 1942, W.F. Barker 1776 ( NBG!); Plumstead (QDS: 3318 CD), 7 May 1944, Barwick s.n. ( SAM 55372!); Rondebosch Common (QDS: 3318 CD), 8 June 1950, Heginbotham 145 ( NBG!) ; Cape flats prope Wynberg (QDS: 3318 CD), 1 May 1889, Schlechter 624 ( K!, ZT!); Kenilworth near Cape Town (QDS: 3318 CD), May 1892, Schlechter s.n. ( BOL 62688!); Rondebosch Common (QDS: 3318 CD), 9 May 2007, Snijman 2106 ( NBG!); Rondebosch Common, 30 June 1941, Walgate 259 ( NBG!); Camp Ground (QDS: 3318 CD), 8 May 1896, Wolley-Dodd 1059 ( K!, BOL!); KalabasKraal (QDS: 3318 DA), 4 June 1971, Negin 19 ( NBG!); KalabasKraal (QDS: 3318 DA), 8 June 1965, Thompson 105 ( NBG!); Langverwacht above Kuils River (QDS: 3318 DC), 20 June 1974, E.G.H. Oliver 4881 ( NBG!); Doornhoogde , Cape Flats (QDS: 3318 DC), Zeyher s.n. ( K 256002 !); Stellenbosch vlakte tussen Duthie Reservaat en Bosbou fakulteit (QDS: 3318 DD), 14 June 1963, Bos 42 ( NBG!); Limietberg, J.N. Biers Reserve (QDS: 3318 DD), 8 May 2003, Davids 10 ( NBG!); Farm Kliprug, Eof BergRiver between Paarl and Franschhoek (QDS: 3318 DD) , 15 June 1995, Snijman 1453 ( NBG!) ; Stellenbosch flats in front of faculty of forestry (QDS: 3318DD), 24 April 1969, Thompson 727 ( NBG!) ; Romansrivier Station (QDS: 3319 AC) , 27 April 2010, Koopman sub CR6068 ( NBG!) ; Tulbagh, Witzenbergen Flats (QDS: 3319 AC) , April 1887, Marloth 1704 ( PRE!) ; Wellington, Elandsberg Private Nature Reserve (QDS: 3319 AC) , 12 June 2000, E. Parker 459 ( NBG!) ; ibidem, 13 May 1999, Snijman 1692 ( NBG!, PRE!); flats NW of Prince Alfred Hamlet (QDS: 3319 AD) , 6 May 1975, E.G.H. Oliver 5909 ( NBG!) ; Groenrivier , Botha (QDS: 3319 CB) , 22 April 1978, Walters 1836 ( NBG!) ; Wyzersdrift bridge, Goudini (QDS: 3319 CB) , 14 May 1981, Walters 2052 ( NBG!) ; near Villiersdorp (QDS: 3319 CD) , 5 May 1974, Bayliss 6689 ( NBG!) ; Wagenbooms River (QDS: 3319 CD) , May, Burke 103 ( K!) ; Slangkop (QDS: 3418 AB) , 9 May 1942, Compton 13209 ( NBG!) ; between Fish Hoek and Kommetjie (QDS: 3418 AB) , June 1947, Lewis 2375 ( SAM!) ; Bergvliet (QDS: 3418 AB) , 23 May 1916, Purcell 159 ( SAM!) ; Cape Flats prope Cape Town (QDS: 3418 BA) , June 1875, H. Bolus 2813 ( SAM!) ; Kuils River, Faure , Farm Vergenoegd (QDS: 3418 BA) , 4 May 2006, Helme 3938 ( NBG!) ; Faure (QDS: 3418 BA) , 2 May 1975, E.G.H. Oliver 5900 ( NBG!) ; Strand (QDS: 3418 BB) , 24 April 1946, Gerstner 6159 ( PRE!) ; flats near Harmony, Gordon’s Bay (QDS: 3418 BB) , 17 May 1975, E.G.H. Oliver 5916 ( NBG!) ; Helderberg Nature Reserve (QDS: 3418 BB) , 10 May 1993, Runnalls 494 ( NBG!) ; flats near Harmony (QDS: 3418 BB) , 31 April 1965, Thompson 88 ( NBG!) ; Theewaterskloof area, turnoff to Chiltern Farms from Viljoens Pass / Villiersdorp Road (QDS: 3419 AA) , 21 May 1979, Thompson 4013 ( NBG!) ; NE shores of Botrivier Vlei (QDS: 3419 AC) , 28 May 1997, Helme 1266 ( NBG!) . Inexact localities: South Africa, Harvey 105 ( K! [image]); foothills of Riviersonderend Mtns, May 1950, Lewis 3023 ( SAM!) .

Figures

FIGURE 27. Distribution maps for A, Pauridia aquatica from Northern, Western and Eastern Cape; B, P. alba from Western Cape, South Africa.

FIGURE 28. Pauridia alba. A, whole plant in fruit; B, leaf in transverse section; C, flower; D, stamen in dorsal view; E, style and stigma branches; F, ovary in transverse section; G, seed. Scale bar A = 20 mm; B = 2mm; C = 10 mm; D, E = 4 mm; F = 1.5 mm. Scale bar G = 0.5 mm. Drawn by Tracey Nowell from E. Parker 459 (NBG!).