Cosmibuena Ruiz & Pav., nom. cons. (Rubiaceae: Hillieae) Charlotte M. Taylor [webpage] Missouri Botanical Garden P.O. Box 299 St. Louis, MO 63166 Cosmibuena 1 Cosmibuena Ruiz & Pav. includes 4 species of succulent, terrestrial or usually epiphytic shrubs and small trees distributed rather widely in the mainland New World tropics. Cosmibuena plants are found in wet tropical forests, from low to high elevations (including mangroves). The genus can be recognized by its combination of well developed, oblanceolate to obovate stipules that are shortly united around the stem and held erect and flattened together in bud, its succulent leaves with the secondary venation usually not visible, its rather large salverform corollas with long tubes, and its cylindrical woody capsules that contain numerous flat papery seeds with winged and sometimes shortly fringed margins. The fragrant white flowers are nocturnal and apparently last for only one night. The corollas turn yellow the next morning and fall off during that day. The flowers are homostylous. The seeds are apparently wind-dispersed. The corolla lobes are convoluted in bud in C. valerii, but imbricated with 3 lobes external in the other species. Cosmibuena valerii resembles Hillia in this arrangement of the corolla lobes in bud and in its solitary rather than cymose flowers but resembles Cosmibuena in its stipules and seend, thus this species is problematic in taxonomic placement. Species of Cosmibuena can be confused with those of Hillia Jacq. Hillia differs in its interpetiolar stipules (i.e., separate rather than united around the stem) and its seeds with a tuft of silky filaments 1-3 cm long attached at the apical end. Cosmibuena was monographed by Taylor (1992), who included it in a broadly circumscribed tribe Cinchoneae and suggested that based on their clearly close relationship, Hillia also should be classified there. Andersson (1995) however removed Cosmibuena to an expanded tribe Hillieae, a conclusion accepted by subsequent authors. References Andersson, L. & C.M. Taylor. 1994. 162(1-4). Rubiaceae-Cinchoneae-Coptosapelteae. Flora of Ecuador 50: 1-114. Andersson, L. 1995. Tribes and genera of the Cinchoneae complex (Rubiaceae). Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 82: 409-427. Taylor, C.M. 1994a. Revision of Hillia (Rubiaceae). Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 81: 571-609. Taylor, C.M. 1994b. Revision of Cosmibuena (Rubiaceae). Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 79: 886-900. Taylor, C.M. 2001. Rubiaceae. In: W.D. Stevens et al., Flora de Nicaragua. Monogr. Syst. Bot. Missouri Bot. Gard. 85(3): 2206-2284. Key to the Species of Cosmibuena 1. Leaves 1-4.2 cm wide, obovate, obtuse to broadly rounded at apex, drying thickly coriaceous; plants drying red-brown; old stipules turning red; calyx limb divided to base; flowers solitary; capsules smooth; Costa Rica and Panama, 700-2300 m...C. valerii 1. Leaves 2.4-16 cm wide, elliptic to obovate, obtuse or broadly rounded to acute at apex, drying coriaceous to subcoriaceous; plants drying green or gray-green; old stipules turning white; calyx limb truncate or partially to deeply lobed; flowers 2-9 in cymes; capsules smooth or lenticellate. 2. Capsules 7.3-11.2 cm long; seeds 7-9 mm long (including the wing); leaves obtuse to broadly rounded at apex; Costa Rica to Peru, 0-500 m... C. macrocarpa 2. Capsules 4.0-6.5 cm long; seeds 5-6 mm long (including the wing); leaves obtuse to acute at apex; southern Mexico to Bolivia, 0-2200 m. 3. Calyx limb truncate to lobed, with its lobes if present shorter than or equal in length to its tube; leaves 3.6-16 cm wide; southern Nicaragua to Bolivia, 0-2200 m...C. grandiflora 3. Calyx limb lobed with its lobes longer than its tube; leaves 3-8 cm wide; southern Mexico to northern Nicaragua, 0-500 m...C. matudae TOP List of Names and Synonyms of Cosmibuena The following list is based on monograpic work in this genus. Accepted names are presented in bold; synonymous names appear with an equals sign. Further information on these names can be found in the TROPICOS database [http://www.tropicos.org/]. Buena latifolia Benth. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Buena macrocarpa Benth. = Cosmibuena macrocarpa Buena obtusifolia (Ruiz & Pav.) DC. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Buena skinneri Oerst. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Buena triflora Benth. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cinchona grandiflora Ruiz & Pav. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cinchona longiflora Mutis ex Steud. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena acuminata Ruiz & Pav. = Hillia parasitica Cosmibuena arborea Standl. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena dichotoma (Ruiz & Pav.) G. Don = Joosia dichotoma Cosmibuena gardenioides Wernham = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena gorgonensis Wernham = Cosmibuena macrocarpa Cosmibuena grandiflora (Ruiz & Pav.) Rusby, southern Nicaragua to Bolivia Cosmibuena grandiflora var. latifolia (Benth.) Steyerm. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena holdridgei Monach. = Cosmibuena matudae Cosmibuena latifolia (Benth.) Klotzsch ex Walp. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena macrocarpa (Benth.) Klotzsch, Nicaragua to Peru Cosmibuena matudae (Standl.) L.O. Williams, southern Mexico to central Nicaragua Cosmibuena obtusifolia Ruiz & Pav. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena obtusifolia var. latifolia (Benth.) Hook.f. ex Monach. = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena ochracea Endl. = Ladenbergia hexandra Cosmibuena ovalis = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena paludicola Standl. = Cosmibuena macrocarpa Cosmibuena quinqueflora Klotzsch = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena rhizophorae Standl. = Hillia maxonii Cosmibuena skinneri (Oerst.) Hemsley = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena triflora (Benth.) Klotzsch = Cosmibuena grandiflora Cosmibuena valerii (Standl.) C.M. Taylor, Costa Rica, Panama Hillia chiriquiensis Dwyer = Cosmibuena valerii Hillia ligulifolia Dwyer = Cosmibuena valerii Hillia matudae Standl. = Cosmibuena matudae Hillia valerii Standl. = Cosmibuena valerii Text and Images, unless otherwise indicated, Copyright © by Charlotte M. Taylor. All rights reserved. This webpage was revised on April 8, 2008. TOP