Hedyotis angulata Fosberg ex Shinners
Family: Rubiaceae
Synonyms: Hedyotis nigricans (Lam.) Fosberg var.
angulata
(Fosberg ex Shinners) W.H. Lewis;
Hedyotis nigricans (Lam.) Fosberg var.
parviflora (Gray) W.H. Lewis;
Hedyotis stenophylla Torr. & Gray var.
parviflora Gray;
Houstonia rupicola Greenm.
Remarks: About six years ago, Guy Nesom told Rich Spellenberg (who alerted
me) that
Hedyotis angulata occurred in New Mexico. Now I am unable
to verify this species for the state. I have been corresponding
with Tom Wendt (TEX Curator) and Guy Nesom and received the following
information from them.
Tom could not find a TEX specimen of
H. angulata from New Mexico. He points
out that the
Hedyotis collection at TEX has been recently studied
and annotated by Billy Turner and his findings published in a
series of Phytologia articles. Turner mentions and maps
H. angulata
in one of these papers (Turner 1995) because it superficially
resembles
Hedyotis nigricans - which is the topic of the paper.
Turner places
H. angulata in the Big Bend counties of Pecos, Crockett
and Val Verde, Texas and in adjacent Coahuilla, Mexico. He shows
Hedyotis nigricans
var.
papillacea in north and Trans-Pecos Texas. Tom says there
are two specimens of the latter from the Guadalupe Mountains on the
NM side of the border. He suspects that these may have been the
source of the rumor that
H. angulata occurred in New Mexico.
Guy said "I don't remember the exact conversation with Rich
S. but it does sound like I was looking at those two
papillacea
and calling them
Hedyotis angulata. My concept of the taxa at that time
clearly wasn't very sophisticated."
Tom holds out the other possibility that the circumscriptions
of
H. angulata and
H. nigricans var.
papillacea may vary between
Turner and Ed Terrell (Univ of Maryland) and that Terrell might
perhaps call the Guadalupe Mountain plants
H. angulata. Anyone reading
Phytologia lately can see that these two authorities differ widely
(and forcefully) in their opinions concerning
Hedyotis.
I could contact Terrell for his opinion, but don't feel like this
would serve the NMRPTC purposes. If the Trans-Pecos populations
are
H. angulata, then it is not a very rare plant. For now, I
think we should drop
Hedyotis angulata from the rare plant list
and from the Working Index of New Mexico Plant Names.
Important Literature:
Turner, B.L. 1995. Taxonomic overview of
Hedyotis
nigricans (Rubiaceae) and closely allied taxa. Phytologia 79(1):12-21.
Information Compiled By: Bob Sivinski
