Chamaedorea exorrhiza H. Wendl. ex Dammer

Dowe, John Leslie & Hodel, Donald Robert, 2021, Taxonomy and nomenclature of four unresolved names published by Udo Dammer in the genus Chamaedorea (Arecaceae), Candollea 76 (1), pp. 93-98 : 96

Chamaedorea exorrhiza H. Wendl. ex Dammer in Gard. Chron. ser. 3, 38: 44. 1905.

Lectotypus (designated here): CoSTA RICA: San Miguel, near Sarapiqui River , 16.V.1857, H. Wendland 71 ( GOET [ GOET025396 ]!).

= Chamaedorea tepejilote Liebm. in Mart., Hist. Nat. Palm. 3: 308. 1849 ( Fig. 1A ). ≡ Stephanostachys tepejilote (Liebm.) Oerst. in Vidensk. Meddel. Naturhist. Foren. Kjøbenhavn 1858: 28. 1859. ≡ Nunnezharia tepejilote (Liebm.) Kuntze , Revis. Gen. Pl. 2: 731. 1891.

Holotypus: MEXICo: Oaxaca, Chinantla, S. Pedro Tepinapa , VII.1842, Liebmann s.n. ( C [ C10006547 ]! ; iso-: P [ P00725352 , P00725253 ]!, US [ US00021723 , US00021747 ]!).

= Chamaedorea exorrhiza H. Wendl. ex Guillaumin in Bull. Mus. Natl. Hist. Nat. 28: 542. 1922 [nom. illeg.].

Lectotypus (designated here): [ CoSTA RICA]: cultivated in Paris, “1921–1922”, Guillaumin s.n. ( P [3-part specimen: P00725349 , P00725350 excl. fragm. packet, P00725351 ]!).

Notes. – DAMMER (1905) provided the following description when presenting the firstuse of the name Chamaedorea exorrhiza : leaves pinnate, segments lanceolate, 10–20 per side, more than 5 cm wide, 9-nerved. Dammer’s publication clearly satisfies the requirements of valid publication of the name. GUILLAUMIN (1922: 542) described the same species based on a plant cultivated in the greenhouse in Paris grown from seeds received from Wendland in 1901 because he believed that Dammer’s species was not validly published and noted that: “C’est sans doute la même espèce que celle signalée sans description, sous le nom de C. exorrhiza Wendl par Dammer [It is probably the same species reported without description, under the name of C. exorrhiza Wendl by Dammer]”. Guillaumin’s name has therefore to be treated as an illegitimate later homonym, and a heterotypic synonym, of Dammer’s name. Original material in P is a mixed gathering between the Guillaumin collection and the seeds sent by Wendland in the fragment packet of P00725350. Therefore a lectotype is designated here on the Guillaumin cultivated collection from 1921–1922.

Guillaumin’s later homonym has previously been proposed as the valid publication of Chamaedorea exorrhiza ( HODEL, 1992a; GOVAERTS et al., 2021).

The lectotype of Chamaedorea exorrhiza H. Wendl. ex Dammer chosen here [GOET025396] consists of a single collection composed of five sheets. One sheet has a complete inflorescence including bracts, an inflorescence without bracts, and a leaf petiole. The remaining four sheets hold a complete leaf divided into four sections. The collection was labelled by Wendland as “ Morenia (Stephanostachya) exorrhiza ”.

Chamaedorea tepejilote ( Fig. 1A ) is one of the most wideranging species in the genus, occurring from Colombia north into Mexico. One of the largest species of the genus in habit, it is unusually variable across its range and is found as solitary or cespitose individuals and has leaves and inflorescences that vary in size and quantity of subdivisions (pinnae and rachillae). In the northern part of its range, especially in Guatemala and southern Mexico, it has been domesticated and cultivated for thousands of years for its unopened staminate inflorescences consumed as a cooked vegetable called “pacaya”.

Figures

Fig. 1.– A. Chamaedorea tepejilote Liebm., moist montane forest, Suchitepequez,Guatemala; B. Chamaedorea elatior Mart., moist forest, Veracruz, Mexico; C. Chamaedorea warscewiczii H. Wendl., moist forest, Panama; D. Chamaedorea costaricana Oerst., moist forest, Costa Rica. [B: Hodel 949; C: Hodel 725; D: Hodel 693] [Photos: D.R. Hodel]