Description

Trees: branches basitonic, in axils of cataphylls; twigs angular, soon becoming terete, ca. 4 mm diam.; epidermis black, barely visible due to indument cover; terminal bud plump, ca. 1 X 2 mm; cataphylls caducous; indument pubescent, caducous after one flush, the hairs dense, up to 1 mm long, straight to curved, erect, reddish. Leaves: petioles slender, 1–1.7 cm X 1.4–2.2 mm, terete; blades chartaceous, flat, narrowly ovate to elliptic, 4–12 X 2–4 cm; base acute to obtuse, 60–110°; apex attenuate to acute, 35–90°, ultimately acuminate for up to 1.5 cm; margin plane; primary vein above raised, below prominent; secondary veins 3–6 pairs, equidistant, eucamptodromous, above flat, below prominent, diverging at 50–60°, abruptly arching near margin, chordal angle 15–20°, the angle uniform along blade length; tertiary veins above inconspicuous, below raised, random-reticulate to scalariform; higher order veins above inconspicuous, below slightly raised; surface above brown in young leaves, shiny olive-green in older leaves, below brown; indument above puberulous, the primary and secondary veins puberulous, caducous by next flush, below tomentose, the hairs dense, up to 1 mm long, curved to crisped, erect, reddish-brown, denser on the veins, persisting for at least two flushes. Staminate inflorescences: along whole length of flush, erect, peduncles 4–9 cm long, the hypopodia 1–3 cm X 1–2 mm, branch orders 3–4, the second-order branches 4–7, dispersed, lowest branch up to 1.5 cm long, color and indument of all axes as on twigs; bracts and bracteoles caducous (not seen). Staminate flowers: pedicels ca. 6 X 1.6 mm, the diameter even throughout; receptacle flat, ca. 3.5 X 7.2 mm; tepals coriaceous, ovate to obovate, ca. 4 X 3.5 mm, at anthesis erect to spreading, reddish-black, adaxially patchy puberulous; stamens of whorls I and II, the anthers sessile, chubby, trapezoid, ca. 1.6 X 1.6 mm, glabrous, the locelli 4, apical, in a shallow arch, introrse, the glands absent; whorl III columnar, ca. 2.4 X 1.2 mm, glabrous, the locelli 4, the upper pair latrorse, the lower pair extrorse, the glands globular, ca. 1 mm diam.; whorl IV absent; all stamens reddish; pistillode absent. Pistillate flowers and fruitsunknown.

Field notes

Trees up to 30 m tall and 60 cm diam. Inflorescence axes green; tepals light yellowish-green; stamens/staminodes green, the locelli flaps yellow.

Distribution (Figure 13)

Known with certainty only from the type from the Karowtipu mountain (adjacent to the Roraima-Ilú chain of the Guayana highlands).  Range may be extended East to Guyana and French Guiana with the inclusion of two specimens of uncertain identification (see below). Grows in mixed-evergreen forest.  Flowers during the month of October at the beginning of the rainy season.

Additional specimens examined

Discussion

Rhodostemonodaphne mirecolorata is apparently a tall tree, with red tomentose twigs, the indument turning black on older growth.  The leaves are elliptic to narrowly-elliptic, strongly discolorous, dark, shiny green above, lighter, mat green below and with distinctive dense, crisped, red indument (this indument also covers the upper surface of the very young leaves).

Among the species with red tomentose twigs treated here, Rhodostemonodaphne mirecolorata resembles R. rufovirgata the most. Yet the inflorescences and flowers of the two species are completely different, those of R. rufovirgata being much branched and the flowers considerably smaller.  Vegetatively it is almost impossible to tell the two apart.  Two sterile specimens here treated as R. rufovirgata,Mutchnick 966 and Sabatier & Prévost 3710, could just as well be placed in R. mirecolorata.