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Helecho Gigante

Cyathea tenera (J. Sm.) Moore

Comprehensive Description

provided by North American Flora
Cyathea tenera (J. Smith) Griseb. Fl. Brit. W. Ind. 704. 1864
Alsophila tenera J. Smith ; Hook. Sp. Fil. 1 : 49. 1844.
Cyathea barbata Bory ; Mett. I^innaea 36 : 164. 1869.
Cyathea hypotricha Christ, Bull. Herb. Boiss. II. 4 : 947. 1904.
Caudex erect, up to 8 meters high, somewhat spiny, clothed at the summit with copious bright-brown long linear chaff; stipe divergent, stout, 2 cm. in diameter, 40 cm. or more long, castaneous to dull-brownish, paleaceous below with bright-brown linear-lanceolate scales, freely asperous with short straight spines ; lamina ample, variable in size and cutting, the apex short-acuminate, the primary rachis sparsely aculeate or muricate, minutely furfuraceo-pubescent, glabrescent, olivaceous to dull-reddish ; pinnae numerous, alternate, approximate or contiguous, subsessile or short-petiolate, the larger ones 30-45 cm. long, 13-16 cm. broad, oblong, acuminate, the secondary rachis olivaceous or yellowishbrown, muricate or smoothish, closely pubescent, glabrescent ; pinnules about 23-28 pairs, approximate or apart, subsessile or short-petiolate, 7-10 cm. long, 1.2-1.7 cm. broad, elongate-oblong, short-acuminate, very deeply pinnatifid, the costa pilose above with subappressed yellowish hairs, below (together with the costules and veins) clothed with numerous long spreading rigid whitish hairs, the costules also with a few minute bullate yellowishbrown scales below and numerous spreading hairs above ; segments 13-17 pairs, oblong, subfalcate, close, sometimes dilatate, separated by a narrow sinus, obtuse, the margins manifestly crenateserrate ; veins 5-8 pairs, simple or once-forked ; sori small, 4-6 pairs, slightly inframedial ; indusium globose, membranous, exceedingly delicate, rupturing readily at maturity and commonly disappearing, excepting only a small inferior disciform subpersistent remnant ; receptacle small, globose, short.
Type locality : St. Vincent.
Distribution : General in the lesser Antilles and Trinidad ; known also from Cuba and Costa Rica. Variable.
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bibliographic citation
Lucien Marcus Underwood, Ralph Curtiss BenedictWilliam Ralph Maxon. 1909. OPHIOGLOSSALES-FILICALES; OPHIOGLOSSACEAE, MARATTIACEAE, OSMUNDACEAE, CERATOPTERIDACEAE, SCHIZAEACEAE, GLEICHENIACEAE, CYATHEACEAE (pars). North American flora. vol 16(1). New York Botanical Garden, New York, NY
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