Romulea camerooniana Baker

Manning, John C. & Goldblatt, Peter, 2001, the Arabian Peninsula and Socotra including new species, biological notes, and a new infrageneric classification, Adansonia (3) 23 (1), pp. 59-108 : 73-74

2. Romulea camerooniana Baker

J. Bot. 14: 236 (1876); Goldblatt, Fl. Zamb. 12(4):

65 (1993), Fl. Trop. E. Africa, Iridaceae : 36

(1996). — Type: Mann 2135, Cameroon, Mt .

Cameroon (holo-, K!).

Romulea campanuloides Harms, Bot. Jahrb. Syst. 19, Beibl. 47: 28 (1894) M. P . de Vos, J . S . African Bot., Suppl. 9: 207 (1972); Fl. S . Africa 7(2), fasc. 2: 52 (1983). — Type: Volkens 782, Tanzania, Mt. Kilimanjaro (holo-, B!; iso-, K!) .

Romulea thodei subsp. gigantea M.P. de Vos, J. S. African Bot. 21: 106 (1955). — Romulea campanuloides var. gigantea (M.P. de Vos) M.P. de Vos, J. S. African Bot., Suppl. 9: 117 (1972); Fl. S. Africa 7(2), fasc. 2: 37 (1983). — Type: Rust 622, South Africa, Western Cape, Riversdale (holo-, B) .

Plants mostly 8-20 cm, stem subterranean; corm obliquely pointed with a narrow basal ridge. Leaves (1)2-6, basal, filiform, narrowly 4-grooved, c. 1 mm diam.; outer bracts with narrow or hardly visible membranous margins, inner bracts with narrow, colorless membranous margins. Flowers magenta or pink to white with a yellow cup, tepals elliptic, mostly 12-25 mm long; filaments 4-7 mm long, anthers 3-7 mm long. Fruiting peduncles erect. Flowering: May- Feb.

A widespread African species, Romulea camerooniana occurs in rocky or grassy highlands, extending from the Drakensberg of Eastern Cape Province, South Africa, near Rhodes to Kenya, Sudan, and southern Ethiopia. Outlying populations occur in Cameroon in the west. The species was treated as R. campanuloides by DE VOS, but she has confirmed (pers. comm.) that R. camerooniana , described in 1876, is conspecific with R. campanuloides which was described only in 1894. Different chromosome numbers in the southern African and tropical African population counted, 2 n = 22 versus 2 n = 26 are puzzling ( DE VOS 1972; GOLDBLATT & TAKEI 1997). Additional counts from tropical African populations are needed before this difference can be assessed. DE VOS (1972, 1983) recognized two varieties of the species, the typical with flowers up to 25 mm long and the style branches usually shorter than the anthers, and var. gigantea with the flower 25-35 mm long and the style branches usually exceeding the anthers. The ranges of the two varieties overlap completely. The large-flowered plants do not, we believe, merit taxonomic status. Most species of Romulea have smaller- and larger-flowered races and flower size alone should not be used to differentiate taxa unless the difference is extreme and without intermediates.