identifier	taxonID	type	CVterm	format	language	title	description	additionalInformationURL	UsageTerms	rights	Owner	contributor	creator	bibliographicCitation
97E13C52554C5B0CB795DBFD87D160D4.text	97E13C52554C5B0CB795DBFD87D160D4.taxon	http://purl.org/dc/dcmitype/Text	http://rs.tdwg.org/ontology/voc/SPMInfoItems#GeneralDescription	text/html	en	Afzelia corallina A. Bianchi, S. Orsenigo & Baldesi 2026	<div><p>Afzelia corallina A. Bianchi, S. Orsenigo &amp; Baldesi sp. nov.</p><p>Figs 2, 3, 4, 5</p><p>Type.</p><p>Tanzania • Zanzibar, Pemba Island, Micheweni Dist., Ngezi-Vumawimbi Nature Forest Reserve, coral rag forest in <a href="https://tb.plazi.org/GgServer/search?materialsCitation.longitude=39.674&amp;materialsCitation.latitude=-4.94073" title="Search Plazi for locations around (long 39.674/lat -4.94073)">Tondooni Peninsula</a>; - 4.94073, 39.67400; 10 December 2024; Bianchi, Orsenigo &amp; Baldesi 476 (holotype, NHT!; Isotypes, EA!, FT!, PAV!, TR!)</p><p>Diagnosis.</p><p>This species is similar to Afzelia quanzensis but can be distinguished by paniculate inflorescence (vs. racemose or one-forked inflorescence), number of flowers per inflorescence (up to 150 vs. 4–12), colour of the large petal (white and red, with a white median stripe vs. entirely green outside and red inside, occasionally mottled with white or greenish-white), the shape of small petals (subulate vs. clavate), the colour of stamen and staminodes that are crimson red in A. corallina and green, often with a red base, in A. quanzensis . Moreover, A. corallina shows a bigger style (40–50 mm vs 25 mm) and ovary (7 × 2.2–2.7 vs. 3.5 × 1.5 mm) compared to A. quanzensis . Finally, pods are thinly woody and 1–4 seeded (vs. thickly woody and 5–13 seeded in A. quanzensis), and seeds have much smaller aril (4–5 vs. 8–13 mm long) (Table 1).</p><p>Description.</p><p>Large tree up to 20 (– 25) metres tall, with spreading crown, emergent above surrounding vegetation; bole straight, cylindrical, unbranched for the first (2 –) 8–10 metres, up to 1.1 m in diameter, not conspicuously buttressed; wood heavy, durable, dark brown to reddish, with yellowish pores; bark light brown with white, lichen-like patches, covering 10–30 % of bark surface on older wood and up to 80 % on smaller branches; bark scaling off in patches in the lower part of the bole, otherwise smooth; twigs glabrous, with longitudinal striations and numerous lenticels, ca. 1 × 1 mm. Stipules not seen; leaves dark green with yellowish venation, glabrous in all parts, paripinnate; leaflets (2 –) 3–4 pairs, opposite to sub-opposite; leaf petiole 2–3 cm long, rachis 8–10 cm long, petiolules 3.5–5.5 mm long, twisted, with one side of the leaf base slightly decurrent down the petiolule for up to 2.5–3 mm; leaflets (5 –) 9–12 (– 16) cm long, (4.5 –) 6.5–7.5 cm wide, ovate to oblong, tending to (slightly) falcate in larger leaflets, especially in distal pair; leaflets base rounded and asymmetrical at base, leaflet tip rounded to acute distally with emarginate apex; venation pinnate, with secondary veins clearly visible and raised in both adaxial and abaxial leaf surfaces, brochidodromous, tertiary venation reticulated. Inflorescence terminal, a corymbose panicle branched up to 7 times or more, up to 150 - flowered; inflorescence rachis and primary branches puberulous; pedicel 7–8 mm long, bracteoles not seen. Flowers (very) sweetly scented; hypanthium 1.5–2.5 (– 3) cm long, puberulous; sepals light green to yellowish in older flowers, puberulous on outside and puberulous to sparsely pubescent inside, the outer two elliptic to ovate, 12–15 × 6–7 mm, the inner 2 oblong but slightly wider distally, 17–18 × 7–8 mm wide; large petal turned upwards, suffused with light-pink abaxially (paler at anthesis and darkening as the flower ages) and bicoloured adaxially, pure white with a conspicuous crimson red bilobed marking in the centre speckled with darker spots at its edges, (24 –) 28–33 mm long, with an 8–10 mm long claw widening into a narrowly bilobed lamina 20–25 mm wide; large petal pubescent adaxially from base to widening of the lamina or shortly after, puberulous abaxially for ⅔ of petal length; small petals 4, greenish-white, shortly pubescent, subulate, 6–9 × ca. 0.5 mm; fertile stamens 7, crimson red, pilose proximally to sparsely pilose and eventually glabrous in last ¼, 3–4 cm long, 0.5–1 mm in diameter, at the base; anthers dorsifixed, red with two longitudinal openings revealing yellow pollen, 2.5–3.5 × 0.7–0.8 mm; staminodes 2 at base of large petal, crimson red, pubescent, 13–15 mm long, at the base of large petal, some flowers with 2 extra staminodes, minute, green, puberulous, up to 5 mm long, in between the longer staminodes; ovary green, glabrous to shortly pubescent, 7 × 2.2–2.7 mm long, style glabrous, crimson red, 4–5 cm long. Stigma capitate, ca. 1 mm in diameter. Pods woody, brown outside and tan inside, 7–13 × 4.5–6 cm, beaked distally, (1 –) 2–3 (– 4) seeded; valve ca. 3 mm thick, increasing to 5–6 mm near the sutures, septa not always present; seeds black, flattened dorsiventrally, 25–32 mm long × 12–14 mm wide × 6 mm thick, with a small, yellowish-orange thin aril covering the seed for 4–5 mm.</p><p>Phenology.</p><p>Found in flower in November – January, seeds dispersed in September – November.</p><p>Etymology.</p><p>The epithet corallina (from the Latin ‘ corallium ’, coral) refers to this species’ habit of growing on coral rag, a rubbly limestone composed of ancient coral reef material. Furthermore, the colourful and dense inflorescence may resemble a coral head, as does the red marking on the large petal.</p><p>Distribution.</p><p>Despite extensive searches in the area, Afzelia corallina is only known from a narrow stretch of coast in the Tondooni Peninsula in SW Ngezi-Vumawimbi Forest Reserve, Pemba Island, Tanzania.</p><p>Ecology.</p><p>This species is strictly associated with coastal forests and apparently does not occur more than 200 metres away from shore. It is associated with the following taxa; trees: Avicennia marina (Forssk.) Vierh. ( Acanthaceae), Bourreria petiolaris (Lam.) Thulin ( Boraginaceae), Deinbollia borbonica Scheff. ( Sapindaceae), Euphorbia tirucalli L. ( Euphorbiaceae), Grewia capitellata Bojer ( Malvaceae), Haplocoelum inoploeum Radk. ( Sapindaceae), Manilkara sulcata (Engl.) Dubard ( Sapotaceae), Milicia excelsa (Welw.) C. C. Berg ( Moraceae), Pandanus kirkii Rendle ( Pandanaceae), Polysphaeria parvifolia Hiern ( Rubiaceae), Rhizophora mucronata Lam. ( Rhizophoraceae), Sonneratia alba Sm. ( Lythraceae), Tamarindus indica L. ( Fabaceae), Xylocarpus granatum J. Koenig ( Meliaceae), climbers: Uvaria lucida Benth. subsp. lucida ( Annonaceae), Salacia elegans Welw. ex Oliv. ( Celastraceae), Ancylobothrys petersiana (Klotzsch) Pierre ( Apocynaceae), Landolphia kirkii Dyer ( Apocynaceae), Flagellaria guineensis Schumach ( Flagellariaceae), shrubs: Acridocarpus zanzibaricus A. Juss ( Malpighiaceae). Indigofera trita L. f. ( Fabaceae), Cremaspora triflora (Thonn.) K. Schum. subsp. confluens (K. Schum.) Verdc. ( Rubiaceae), herbs: Microsorum scolopendria (Burm. f.) Copel. ( Polypodiaceae), Sansevieria kirkii Baker var. pulchra N. E. Br ( Asparagaceae) and the bulbous Gonatopus boivinii (Decne.) Engl. ( Araceae).</p><p>Conservation status.</p><p>Afzelia corallina is currently known only from its type locality, where fewer than 30 mature individuals have been recorded. Although this locality lies within the Ngezi – Vumawimbi Forest Reserve, illegal extraction of hardwood remains a persistent threat. This species, together with Intsia bijuga, Milicia excelsa, and Erythrophleum suaveolens (Guill. &amp; Perr.) Brenan, is specifically targeted by illegal loggers. A concerning number of individuals, particularly those occurring along the coast, exhibit poor crown condition and apparent dieback. Likely, this distribution is due to the extraction of most of the straight trees occurring farther inland, while the individuals growing along the coast might have been spared because of the misshapen boles. Based on our observations, the optimum habitat for this species is behind the salt spray zone. In addition, seed production appears to be extremely low, with only a few seeds produced each year. Regeneration by seed appears poor to absent, with young individuals observed resulting from suckering from stressed mature plants growing directly along the coast. Given its restricted distribution and threats due to illegal logging and touristic infrastructure development (Caro et al. 2025), A. corallina should be assessed as Critically Endangered (CR). It clearly meets criteria B 2 ab (iii, v); D (extent of occurrence &lt;100 km 2 and presence at a single threat-defined location, with continuing decline in the area, extent, and quality of habitat and number of mature individuals; fewer than 50 mature individuals) (IUCN 2012). Propagation and in situ and circa situ replanting efforts are underway as part of a project funded by Fondation Franklinia and implemented by Istituto Oikos. Despite the threats posed by touristic infrastructure development, carefully managed ecotourism might represent a complementary conservation opportunity: Oikos, the NGO that partly funded this research, has been promoting sustainable ecotourism in Ngezi – Vumawimbi and mapping individuals of particular interest that could be incorporated into guided visits, hopefully generating local incentives for habitat protection. Worryingly, felling remains a threat, and one individual has been found logged during the last survey, with two additional trees found felled by recent storms.</p><p>Notes.</p><p>This species shows some affinities with Intsia bijuga, especially in the congested inflorescence, the reddish stamen, and the thinly woody pod, with few flattened seeds. It is interesting to note that across the whole range of Afzelia quanzensis (Fig. 6) and Intsia bijuga, Pemba Island is the only place where both species coexist. Further molecular analyses will help to shed light on the origin of this species.</p><p>The three Detarioideae occurring on the island are not distinguished by local people and are referred to, in Swahili, by a single name, ‘ Mbambakofi ’.</p></div>	https://treatment.plazi.org/id/97E13C52554C5B0CB795DBFD87D160D4	Public Domain	No known copyright restrictions apply. See Agosti, D., Egloff, W., 2009. Taxonomic information exchange and copyright: the Plazi approach. BMC Research Notes 2009, 2:53 for further explanation.		Pensoft via Plazi	Bianchi, Andrea;Baldesi, Giacomo;Calzoni, Daniela;Delledonne, Massimo;Focaia, Riccardo;Luke, Quentin;Khamis, Khamis A.;Tomasi, Laura;Orsenigo, Simone	Bianchi, Andrea, Baldesi, Giacomo, Calzoni, Daniela, Delledonne, Massimo, Focaia, Riccardo, Luke, Quentin, Khamis, Khamis A., Tomasi, Laura, Orsenigo, Simone (2026): Afzelia corallina (Fabaceae), a new micro-endemic tree from Pemba Island, Zanzibar, Tanzania. PhytoKeys 273: 55-69, DOI: 10.3897/phytokeys.273.186903
