Frank

The taxonomy and nomenclature of the genus Hydnophytum have not been revised since the early 1900s so there has been plenty of time for naming errors to creep in and get propagated along with the plants.  

One persistent mistake is misidentifying plants of Hydnophytum formicarum and Hydnophytum moseleyanum.  When I say H. moseleyanum I am referring to a complex of 6 or 7 closely related species that all look very similar to H. moseleyanum. These related species include: H. loranthifolium, papuanum, crassifolium, longistylum and philippinense. It is likely that most of these will get lumped together into H. moseleyanum in the revision of the genus that is currently being prepared in Europe.

Hydnophytum formicarum is a widespread species and shows considerable variation in some traits, including plant size and the nature of the caudex

The best way to tell Hydnophytum formicarum and moseleyanum plants apart is with leaf shape. leaf texture and leaf veins.

 

Hydnophytum formicarum leaves have a normal to leathery texture.  H. moseleyanum leaves are somewhat to quite succulent.

 

The three leaves on the left are from H. formicarums. The three leaves on the right are typical H. moseleyanum leaves. This photo is of the lower leaf surfaces. Notice the differences in leaf shapes and the veins. On older H. moseleyanum leaves, like these, the veins are almost impossible to see on the lower surface of the leaves.

This next photo is a close-up view (upper leaf surface) of Hydnophytum formicarum on the left and H. moseleyanum on the right to get a better comparison of the veins. Notice the important fact that H. formicarum leaves have 6 to 12 pairs of veins on each leaf while H. moseleyanum leaves have only 3 or 4 pairs of veins on each leaf.

 

 

Young plants are easier to tell apart because of the obvious ridges on the caudex on many (but not all) forms of H. formicarum.  Hydnophytum moseleyanum types never have ridges on young plants.

The two plants on the left are Hydnophytum formicarums and the two pots on the right are Hydnophytum moseleyanums.

 

 

Notice also that the caudex on young Hydnophytum formicarum plants tends to be quite flat whereas the caudex on Hydnophytum moseleyanum plants gets taller right from the start. 

Quote

No, Todd. Your plant depicted appears to be H formicarum "Pumpkin" (my denomination). This is just a very nice form of formicarum that originated from Merlin Sy.

Jay, you wrote the above quote.  Where is the photo by Todd that you are talking about?

Also, let me add some useful information about the H formicarum from Merlin Sy that Jay calls the "Pumpkin".  I got seeds of this same species from Merlin in October of 2006, and he provided this information with the seeds: "from a mountain range in Quezon Province, on the Island of Luzon in the Philippines"

Hi Todd,  I think Jay is going to end up confirming that that was my mistake in my email to you.  I think Jay has used Philippine dwarf to mean the plant he also calls "shoe caudex"

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The recent two day hiatus of this forum was caused by the transfer of forum ownership to me, Frank Omilian, from its founder Dr. Andreas Wistuba. 

 

We all owe a great debt of gratitude to Andreas for establishing this forum.  We also need to acknowledge the extraordinary contributions of a number of individuals who have shared their photos, taxonomic insights, cultural notes, research and other information here.  It is this treasure trove of ant-plant information that has motivated me to take over the forum at Andreas’s suggestion.  This material is too good and too important to disappear from the internet.

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These are exciting times in the world of ant-plants – the new young gun, Guillaume Chomicki is pushing the taxonomy, exciting new species are being discovered and new species are coming into cultivation.  This forum is moving forward with this wave and I hope you all continue to participate and contribute.

Great stuff Jay!  So well grown as usual, and very nice photos.

 

The only one I have grown is M. brunei.  I concur that it likes humidity and warmth.  I also make sure it has air movement around it.  I got that from an article by the American Fern Society about the culture of these plants (specifically on page 15).  Here is a link to that article:  http://amerfernsoc.org/ffa/Fiddlehead%20Forum/FF%20Volume%2035-36/Fiddlehead%20Forum%20Vol%2036%20No%202-3.pdf

 

I also discovered that for me, I get much better production of the tubers when I give the plants more light, when I have the plants close to my fluorescent bulbs.

 

While I do get ants moving into my Rubiaceous ant-plants once they get large enough and into at least a few of my Lecanopteris ant-ferns I have never had ants move into the M. brunei tubers.  Do you have ants in your M. brunei or bismarckii tubers Jay?

Some more thoughts here.  Looks like no bracts in the alveoli - that is going to rule out a lot of things.  As will the branched spines rimming the alveoli.

 

In the top photo one gets the idea this is perhaps a pendulous species - is that the case as well for other unphotographed plants of this species Derrick? 

 

Also in the top photo it looks to me like there is a different species to the right of the target plant.  And it has a more upright aspect and the spines on the caudex look like the spines of a M. tuberosa pulvinata caudex - which as Aurelien points out is the expected, most common variant of M tuberosa in this part of PNG

Interesting plant.  Thanks for your efforts to get us new information and great photos Derrick!  Your efforts are much appreciated.

 

Why the assumption that it is a M. tuberosa?   I have never seen that kind of caudex surface before on a tuberosa.  As the attached map shows there are other possible species.  The localities plotted on the map are the collections of each species as cited by Huxley and Jebb in their revision of the genus Myrmecodia.

Here is a link to an enlargable photo of one of the type sheets.  The label has no info on fruit color

 

http://apps.kew.org/herbcat/getImage.do?imageBarcode=K000172625

Here is a link to a Jestor page that shows 5 type sheets.  You need an account to enlarge the photos to a readable size, I have no account.

 

https://plants.jstor.org/search?filter=free_text&so=ps_group_by_genus_species+asc&Query=Hydnophytum+ferrugineum

It would appear as if Drs. Huxley & Jebb have buttered their bread on both sides as concerns the Drs. van Leeuwen’s collection   #9540.

 

There are two duplicate herbarium sheets of this collection available online – one at Kew and one at the National Herbarium of the Netherlands (NHN).  On both the plant is identified by the van Leeuwens as “Hydnophytum species.”

 

Huxley and Jebb latter annotated them both as “Hydnophytum mamberamoense” (as “type” on the NHN sheet in 1992 and as “holotype’ on the Kew sheet in December of 1991.)

 

According to the International Plant Name Index "Hydnophytum mamberamoense" is not a validly published name.  Ostensibly, the name was to be published in Huxley and Jebb’s Revision of the genus Hydnophytum that has never happened.

 

And now the other side of the bread:

 

In the 1993 Revision of the genus Myrmecodia, Huxley and Jebb have the van Leeuwen’s collection #9540 identified as a Myrmecodia.  It is listed in the “Uncertain and Little Known Species” section at the end of the article as “Myrmecodia species 1 ‘mamberamoensis’.  Species listed in this section of the revision are informational and do not constitute validly published names, in part because there is no Latin description.  The International Plant Name Index does not list “Myrmecodia mamberamoensis” as a valid name.

 

It looks to me as if it will take a validly published description of this material, one way or the other, to unravel the confusion.

 

In the meantime we can say with certainty that this is not the identity of Elisabeth’s plant because her photo shows red fruits while the Drs. Van Leeuwen say on the sheets that their plant has orange fruits.

Hi Jeff, 

 

Do you mean the two herbarium sheets in the link that Derick provided?  And if so, in which of the two sheets - the one from Kew or the one from the Netherlands do you see pollen and stigma information?.  For me both of those images are too blurry to read the labels, much less see pollen or the stigma.  Does one of the labels I can't read give the pollen and/or stigma information?.

 

If you don't mean the Derrick links - I don't see any picture links that Andreas provided for H. mamberamoense?  Can you provide me a link to his picture that you are talking about please?

 

thanks,  Frank

Jeff, on what picture are you seeing pollen and a 2 lobed stigma?

 

 

on your picture I see  pollen with 3 or4 porate (like myrmephytum  ; myrmecodia  2 or 3 porate ; hydnophytum 4( 3-5)  ), I see also  2 lobed stigma  close to hydnophytum  no ?

Jeff, did you find a description for H. manberamoense anywhere?  The only useful information of the herbarium sheet label is that it has "orange fruits" which is wrong for Elisabeth's plant

 

Derrick, nice resource page you provided, thank you

Once I decided to go with this plant being a Hydnophytum because of the flowers I ruled out the Hydnophytums in Beccari’s work Malesia by looking thru all the plates.  None had the inflorescence that Elisabeth’s plant shows.

I would have liked to have the Dr. Jebb revision of Hydnophytum to consult, but as we all know it has yet to be published -the note about the revision on Dr. Jebb’ home page at the Dublin Botanical notwithstanding.  http://www.botanicgardens.ie/herb/research/hydnophytum.htm

In that note he does say that the revision describes 22 new species of Hydnophytum.  As of this point those 22 new species are in limbo – they will not be official species until the revision is published in a scientific journal.  However the herbarium specimens for at least some of those species are findable online in the virtual herbariums at Kew, LAE – The Papua New Guinea National Herbarium and at Leiden.

I realized that it was a long shot for any of the Huxley and Jebb new species to be a match to a Fakfak plant because H & J  have not collected on the Indonesian west side of the Island of New Guinea.  They have stayed on the eastern PNG side of the island when collecting

.
The information for each “in limbo” species is limited to what is written on the herbarium sheet label until the revision of Hydnophytum is published.  The questions I asked you Elisabeth were to see if I could get some confirmation that your plant matches the herbarium sheet information of the species to be known as Hydnophytum auridemens.

(There are 6 online images for this species in the National Herbarium of the Netherlands that I was unable to access beyond thumbprint size photos because of a “runtime error”)

Here is the link to the Kew herbarium sheet for H. auridemens:
http://plants.jstor.org/stable/10.5555/al.ap.specimen.k000761977

Here is the link to the LAE herbarium sheet which is more useful because you can click on it to enlarge it:
http://www.pngplants.org/specImages/LAE258387.jpg

The label mentions an irregular tuber and orange – brown bract hairs.  The inflorescences look and are placed at least superficially like on Elisabeth’s first photo.

The Kew and LAE labels are identical and the plants were collected on the Island of Missima at 400 meters elevation.  Missima is about 100 miles east of the southeast tip of the “birdtail” peninsula of the Island of New Guinea.  This is clear across the island of New Guinea from Fakfak.  Elisabeth’s plant was on the beach.   There is a better chance that lowland species have a wide distribution than upland species.

I am not saying that your plant is for sure H. auridemens Elisabeth, but I think it, or something like it, has to be considered.  It will be nice when we have the full description of H. auridemens available

Ok guys, what do you think?  Have I overlooked something that would rule out the someday-to –be Hydnophytum auridemens as a possible answer to Elisabeth’s query?

.Guys, if it is a Myrmephytum where is the 6 parted star-like flower?  Elisabeth says the flower is 4 parted and in the photo the tops of the petals look blunt, no points like in the H & J drawings in the Myrmephytum revision and in the Myrmephytums I have flowered.. 

 

I may be working under a misconception as well concerning the purple-brown fleshy bracts.  But both of the Myrmephytums I have grown (beccari and yellow fruited one from the Philippines) have had big obvious purple -brown fleshy bracts that I do not see here. 

 

Because of the two points above I never considered it being a Myrmephytum.in spite of the geography being right - the birdshead is know for Myrmephytums.

 

So, I went off in the direction that it might be a Hydnophytum and based on the questions I am waiting for Elisabeth to answer I may have a canidate to present. (I hope you will still answer my questions Elisabeth, in spite of the possibility that it is a Myrmephytum.) 

I do have some thoughts on this ID but I would like a few more facts please before I have a go at it.  Thanks. 

Do you know a particular elevation where the plant was growing, or lacking that would you characterize it as a lowland species or was it up a mountain some distance above sea level? 

Is there a total lack of spines?  None on the caudex, stem or intermingled with the hairs in the inflorescences? 

Was there rainwater in the caudex when it was collected? 

Were the plants near the ground or high in the tree? 

What is the length and width of a typical leaf in cm?

Do the floral bracts change color when they get wet?

 

Thanks very much Elisabeth

Well, that is another interesting plant Elisabeth!  Is this from Fakfak on Indonesia's "birdhead" again?  The flower looks 3-parted in the photo.  Is that true or just the way the photo makes it look and there are really 4 petals?

Hi Robert,

 

I don't grow the form you are calling 'Bogor Gardens' and do not know who named it.  But if it literally means a plant that was growing wild in some garden in Bogor on the island of W Java than it is probably Myrmecodia tuberosa 'armata'.  I say that because, according to locality data in Huxley and Jebb's revision of the genus Myrmecodia the only variant of Myrmecodia tuberosa growing on that west side of the island of Java is the variant 'armata'

WOW, thanks for that Andreas.  I woke up feeling really different this morning.  I was afraid maybe I was catching a cold.  Now I know it was just because I was "crowd-brained" last night!!!! 

Hi Chris,

Don't we all wish we had the sterile tissue culture and light banks that Andreas has!!!

I have successfully raised all 5 Lecanopteris species from spores that I have tried: mirabilis, curtisii, darnaedii, pumila and sinuosa. For me it is a slow process and I don't get decent little plantlets until the third year. It is a hobby for me and not a business.

I start with compressed peat pellets and soak them in distilled water. Then I cut them in half the long way and lay them in a petri dish or shallow tray. I sprinkle the spores on the exposed surface of the pellet from the cut and spray with a fine mist of distilled water. I insert the whole thing in a zip lock sandwich bag and put under lights, off to the side of the fixture. No real need to water with the totally closed system and I eventually get a green mat of the gametophyte generation (your word prothalli). Once those show up I occasionally open the bag and spray a fine mist of distilled water so the sperm can swim to the eggs. The new sporophyte generation (The ferns with rhizomes and fronds we grow) will eventually start to grow from where fertilization was successful.

Pricking out those sporophytes and putting them into small community pots of milled or chopped sphagnum is where it gets trickier and I loose some. Those community pots also get distilled water and are totally closed in zip lock bags. Only when the plantlets get some rhizome and have several fronds do I gradually start the process of opening the zip lock bag in small increments over a period of many weeks to get the plants off of full humidity

I know some people sterilize the cut open peat pellets in a microwave as you do. I don't, but I sometimes have to "harvest out" fungus or moss from within my zip-locked bags. Again, I am not a commercial grower and don't mind losing a part of my crop to moss and fungi.

To answer your question specifically - I would suggest you not remove the lid on your containers until you have sporophytes growing and be sure to remove the lid by small increments.

Doing a google search for "growing ferns from spores" will give you some other people's experiences and techniques. There is no one right way to do this.

Good luck and let us know how the process goes for you.

 

Frank

Jeff, as Derrick noted this is the type description that Derrick had listed for this species in message #2 of this thread.

 

Derrick,  I did not get this article from the WWW.  I xeroxed the pages from a physical copy of the book.  I live near the University of Michigan and I found out they had the book in their library using Worldcat - a worldwide catalog of books.  www.worldcat.org

 

Frank

This is the original description of H. spathulatum in its original Latin and French in case you native speakers of Latin and French want to check something in the translation.

TABULA CCCXL.

Hydnophytum spathulatum Val. n. sp.

Rubiaceae.

Fig. 1. Ramulus florens. — Fig. 2. Pars sectionis tuberi 1/4: — Fig. 3. Nodus fructifer 3/1. — Fig. 4. Alabastrum 6/1. — Fig. 5. Corolla floris aperti 6/1. — Fig. 6. Stylus 6/1. — Fig. 7. Stamen a dorso et ventre 10/1. — Fig, 8. Calyx 6/1. — Fig. 9. Drupa 5/1, — Fig. 10. Pyrena a dorso et latere dextro 6/1.

Tuber oblongus nunc 25 cm. longus, 10 latus. Rami numerosi semimetrales virgati laxe ramulosi, graciles, intermedia ulteriora 25—35 mm. longa, 2—3 mm. lata, tetragona, subacutangula. Folia subsessilia basi articulata, obovato-spathulata apice rotundata basi sensim in petiolum brevem attenuata, coriacea, siccando nigrescentia. Costa media infra prominens, nervi laterales subimmersi, utrinque conspicui, circ. 4 utrinque. Flores in tuberculis pulvinatis axillaribus circ. 5 mm. altis glomerati nidulantes, basi bracteolis brevissimis membranaceis et pilis rufis circumdati. Calyx parvus cupularis membranacens pilis brevibus rufis appressis parce conspersus. Corolla parva, exsiccata in toto 5 mm. longa, lobis oblongis tubo paullum brevioribus. Antherae erectae sessiles oblongae demum anguste ovato-oblongae apice obtusae basi emarginatae. Faux ad antherarum insertionem fasciculis pilorum villosorum donsorum barbata, intra antheras pilis longioribus densis antheras haud superantibus obsessa. Stylus valde elongatus filiformis parte supriore 1/3 incrassatus (in alabastro incurvus) stigmata brevia papillosa. Drupa parva obovato-globosa apice constricta.

Cette espèce nouvelle très marquée appartient à la section ***B de BECCARI [voir Malesia II, p. 124 (Tab, 32, 34, 37)], section très bien caracterisée d'abord par les fleurs à demi-enfoncées dans des tubercles axillaires, entourées à leur base par des bractéoles quelquefois considérables, et couvertes de poils rousses tant sur le calice que sur les bractéoles, et puis par les pyrènes obovées ar¬rondies au sommet.

BECCARI a décrit trois espèces de cette section: H, tortuosum BECC., B. pet-olatum Becc. tous deux de la Nouvelle Guinée, et H. ovatum MIQ. habitant l'île de. Ternate. J'y ai ajouté déjà deux espèces nouvelles : H. bracteatum VAL|. et H. Kochii VAL. (voir Nova Guinea pars VIII, troisième fascicule, 1911), La sixième espèce que je viens de décrire, a été racoltée par Mr. SMITH dans l'île de Batjan et a été cultivée pendant quelque temps dans le jardin botanique où elle croissait très bien et dépuis s'est perdue. La description est donc faite d'après des exemplaires d'herbier. Comme on le voit facilement, l'espèce a beaucoup de rapports avec le H. ovatum MIQ. et peut être encore plus avec le H. tortuosum (voir BECC. tab. 37, fig. 3 et 4, qui sont à peu près identiques avec les miennes).

Here is the translated version of the Hydnophytum spathulatum description:

TABLE CCCXL.

Hydnophytum spathulatum Val. n. sp.

Rubiaceae.

Fig. 1. Flowering branch. — Fig. 2. Part of a tuber section 1/4: — Fig. 3. Fructiferous node 3/1. — Fig. 4. Bud 6/1. — Fig. 5. Open flower corolla 6/1. — Fig. 6. Style 6/1. — Fig. 7. Dorsal and ventral view of stamen 10/1. — Fig, 8. Calyx 6/1. — Fig. 9. Drupe 5/1, — Fig. 10. Pyrene – dorsal surface and right side 6/1.

Tuber oblong 25 cm long, 10 cm wide. Branches numerous, a half meter, twiggy, widely ramose, thin, internodes up to 25-35 mm long, 2-3 mm wide, tetragonal, with subacute angles. Leaves subsessile with articulate base, obovate-spatulate at the apex, gradually tapering at the base to a short petiole, coriaceous, becoming black when dry. Center vein prominent, lateral veins partly submerged, visible on both surfaces, about 4 on both sides. Flowers clustered, about 5 mm high, nesting in axillary cushion-shaped tubercles, with very short membranaceous bracteoles at the base and surrounded by reddish hairs. Calyx is small, cupular, membranaceous, covered with scattered short red hairs. Corolla small, dry, 5 mm long, lobes oblong slightly shorter than the tube. Anthers erect, sessile, very narrowly ovate-oblong, blunt at the apex, notched at the base. Fauces densely barbate at the point of insertion of the anthers with clusters of soft hairs, covered between the anthers with dense hairs, long but not extending above them. Style very elongated, filiform, thicker at the upper 1/3 (in inflexed bud), stigmas short and papillose. Drupe small obovate-globose, narrow at the apex.

This markedly new species belongs to section ***B of BECCARI (see Malaysia II, page 124, Tables 32, 34, 27), a section well characterized first of all by the semi-nested in the axillary tubercles, surrounded at the base by bracteoles that are considerable at times, and covered with reddish hairs both on the calyx and on the bracteoles; also, by the obovate pyrenes rounded at the top.

BECCARI described three species of this group: H. tortuosum Becc., H. petiolatum Becc., both from New Guinea, and H. ovatum MIQ. from the island of Ternate. I have already added two new species: H. bracteatum VAL. and H. Kochii VAL. (see New Guinea part VIII, third volume, 1911). The sixth species that I have described was gathered by Mr. SMITH in the island of Batjan and has been cultivated for some time in the botanical garden where it grew very well despite its being damaged. Therefore, the description is based on herbarium specimens. It is easy to see that this species has much in common with H. ovatum MIQ and maybe even more with H. tortuosum (see BECC. table. 37, figs. 3 and 4 that are nearly identical with mine).

[above is pages 129 and 130 combined]