Gesneria glandulosa (Griseb.) Urb.

Gesneria glandulosa (Grisebach) Urban

Gesneria glandulosa (Grisebach) Urban, Symb. Ant. 2:373, 1901—Morton in Leon and Alain, Fl. de Cuba 4:463, 1957.

Pentarhaphia glandulosa Grisebach, Cat. Pl. Cub. 199, 1866.

Shrubs: stems woody, erect, to ca 1 m tall, ca 5 mm in diameter at 10 cm below apex, bark red, densely villous with reddish articulated glandular and eglandular trichomes, resinous above, below gray, glabrescent, and rugose, lenticels obscure; branches few, leaf scars not prominent.

Leaves alternate, scattered toward branch apices: petioles sulcate, 0.6–1.3 cm long, 1–2 mm wide, subcoriaceous, red, densely villous, glandular-resinous; blades elliptic, oblong or oblanceolate, 2.8–7.3 cm long, 1.0–2.9 cm wide, base acute, margin subentire below, serrulate above, apex acute, adaxial surface plane or slightly bullate in older leaves, green, glabrescent with a few scattered trichomes along the impressed midvein, abaxial surface green or reddish-brown, villous with trichomes more dense along the reddish prominent veins, resinous.

Inflorescences in upper axils, 3– to several-flowered, length equaling the subtending leaves: peduncles terete, 1.8–2.9 cm long, ca 1 mm in diameter, red, glandular-villous, resinous; bracts 2, lanceolate, ca 1 cm long, ca 2 mm wide, red, villous; pedicels 0.9–2.4 cm long, ca 1 mm in diameter, red, villous, resinous; floral tube shortly turbinate, 2–3 mm long, 4–5 mm wide at apex, red, glandular-villous, resinous on both sides; corolla tube cylindric, curved, subventricose at middle, 2.0–2.3 cm long, 4 mm wide at base, 5 mm wide at middle, 3 mm wide at throat, outside yellow (fide Wright), pilose and glandular with short unstalked glands, inside yellow, glabrous, limb erect or porrect, 5-lobed, lobes suborbicular, 1–2 mm long, 2–3 mm wide, upper lobes dentate, lateral and basal lobes entire, sparsely glandular; stamens 4, shortly exserted, filaments curved, ca 2 cm long, glabrous, anthers not seen; ovary inferior, apex pilose, disc annular, yellow, style ca 2.2 cm long, reddish, sparsely pilose, stigma curved, clavate.

Capsule broadly turbinate, 4–6 mm long, 6–8 mm wide, reddish and pilose to gray and glabrescent with age, persistent calyx lobes patent, costae 5, obscure; seeds rhombic, striate, twisted, ca 1 mm long, 0.5 mm wide, dark red.

TYPE-COLLECTION.—El Yunque de Baracoa, Cuba, C. Wright 3075 (GOET, holotype (Figure 34a); G, GH, K, NY, isotypes).

DISTRIBUTION AND ECOLOGY.—Gesneria glandulosa is endemic to El Yunque de Baracoa in Oriente Province of Cuba in rock crevices at ca 500 m elevation (Figure 29). Underwood (1905) reported that Wright, in correspondence to Asa Gray on 3 June 1861, wrote that he would spend a few days on El Yunque. This species was probably collected in flower at that time.

SPECIMENS EXAMINED.—CUBA. PROVINCE OF ORIENTE: El Yunque de Baracoa, C. Wright 3075 ([1861] GOET, holotype of Pentarhaphia glandulosa Grisebach; [1860–1964] G, GH, K, NY, isotypes).