Cathedra
Description
Shrubs or trees. Flowers small, aggregate in axillary fascicles, pedicels (very) short; connate bracts forming a small cupular persistent epicalyx around the pedicel. Calyx cup-shaped, fleshy, obsoletely 5-6-dentate, small, not or hardly accrescent towards fructification; petals 5-6(-7), free, triangular-lanceolate, fleshy, concave adaxially in lower part to shelter the anthers, barbate above middle adaxially; disc hypogynous, free, fleshy, much accrescent after anthesis to cover the fruit almost completely; stamens 5-6, epipetalous, half as long as petals, filaments flat, thickish; anthers almost tetragonous; ovary very shortly stipitate, conical, 6-12-sulcate, attenuate to a short cylindric style and a slightly 3-lobed stigma, 1-locular above, 2-locular below, with a single ovule pendent from an axile placenta into each cell. Fruit a pseudo-drupe, subtended by the thickened upper part of the pedicel with the epicalyx and calyx, covered halfway to almost completely by the accrescent pericarp-like disc, endocarp crustaceous, endosperm fleshy, containing much amylum and very little or no fatty substances, embryo minute, at apex of the albumen.
Distribution
Guyana present present, Neotropics present, Southern America: Colombia (Colombia present); Peru (Peru present); Venezuela (Venezuela present)
5 species in the neotropics: Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Guyana, Brazil; 1 in Guyana.
Wood
Vessels diffuse, solitary (10-65%) and in radial multiples of 2-4, round, oval or angular, 11-45 per sq. mm, diameter 58-104 μm. Vessel-member length: 306-390 μm. Perforations simple. Intervascular pits alternate, round to polygonal, 3-5 μm. Vessel-ray and vessel-parenchyma pits of two types: half-bordered diffuse to alternate (similar in shape and size to intervascular pits) and large and simple. Thin-walled or sclerotic tyloses infrequently present. Vascular tracheids associated with vessel multiples, sometimes integrating with narrow vessel elements, fairly common to abundant.
Rays of Kribs' heterogeneous type III tending to homogeneous, predomi- nantly uni-seriate, infrequently with short biseriate parts, 20-22 per mm, up to 1168 μm high. Perforated ray cells present in all specimens.
Parenchyma moderately abundant, predominantly apotracheal, diffuse or in small aggregates, partly scanty paratracheal, in strands of 4-8 cells.
Ground tissue composed of very tick-walled libriform fibres, lumen 16-24 μm. Minutely bordered pits with slit-like apertures mainly confined to the radial walls. Length: 1231-1723 μm.
Crystals solitary rhomboidal, in chambered or non-chambered ray and axial parenchyma cells, absent in some specimens.
Rays of Kribs' heterogeneous type III tending to homogeneous, predomi- nantly uni-seriate, infrequently with short biseriate parts, 20-22 per mm, up to 1168 μm high. Perforated ray cells present in all specimens.
Parenchyma moderately abundant, predominantly apotracheal, diffuse or in small aggregates, partly scanty paratracheal, in strands of 4-8 cells.
Ground tissue composed of very tick-walled libriform fibres, lumen 16-24 μm. Minutely bordered pits with slit-like apertures mainly confined to the radial walls. Length: 1231-1723 μm.
Crystals solitary rhomboidal, in chambered or non-chambered ray and axial parenchyma cells, absent in some specimens.