Rubiacearum Americanarum Magna Hama Pars XLIX: Overview of the Neotropical Genus Tournefortiopsis (Guettardeae), With Some New Species and Subspecies

Abstract

Guettarda L. (Rubiaceae) as traditionally circumscribed has been found to be polyphyletic in molecular analyses. Tournefortiopsis Rusby has been separated from it based on details of inflorescence arrangement, pyrene shape, and molecular analyses. We here find additional characters that distinguish this genus: valvate-induplicate corolla lobes and apical horns on the pyrenes. Some features that are usually consistent within species and often genera of Rubiaceae vary within some species of Tournefortiopsis, especially pubescence form and number of corolla lobes and locules. Our taxonomic review of this genus recognizes 12 species found in Central America and perhaps southern Mexico, the Lesser Antilles, and northern and Andean South America, and finds its center of diversity in the Andes of Colombia. Chomelia torrana C. M. Taylor is here transferred to Tournefortiopsis, and four species are newly described here plus one recently recognized variety is raised to species status, all in South America: T. crassifolia (Standl. ex Steyerm.) C. M. Taylor & A. C. Berger, T. deviana C. M. Taylor, T. robusta C. M. Taylor, T. sopkinii C. M. Taylor, and T. tamboana C. M. Taylor. Tournefortiopsis crispiflora (Vahl) Borhidi is here treated as widespread and morphologically variable, with a complex of forms that are not distinctive but completely separable and with notable diversification in Central America and the northern Andes. Four subspecies of T. crispiflora are recognized, with one circumscribed differently than previously and one newly described, T. crispiflora subsp. delicatula C. M. Taylor & A. C. Berger. The identity and characters of T. dependens (Ruiz & Pav.) Borhidi are clarified, and it is more widely distributed than previously noted. Six names are lectotypified.