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Ovidia andina (Poepp. & Endl.) Meissn.

Modern name

Ovidia andina (Poepp. & Endl.) Meisn.

Synonyms

Daphne andina Poepp. & Endl.

A deciduous shrub, often of spare habit, up to 7 ft high; shoots downy when quite young. Leaves oblanceolate to narrowly elliptical or oval, bluntish or rounded at the apex, tapered to a stalkless base, 1 to 5 in. long, 12 to 1 in. wide, dull grey green and glabrous above, glaucous and furnished with appressed hairs beneath. Flowers produced in July along with and terminating the young shoots, crowded thirty or more together on a solitary umbel which is 1 to 112 in. wide, and has a stout, downy main-stalk 34 to 1 in. long. Each flower is about 14 in. wide, white to creamy white with red anthers, the calyx (perianth) funnel-shaped, downy, dividing at the mouth into four oval or obovate lobes. Fruits pure white, egg-shaped, 14 in. long, with the stigma persisting at the end. Individual flower-stalks very slender, 14 to 12 in. long.

Native of Chile up to 5,000 ft altitude; introduced by H. F. Comber during his Andean expedition, 1925-7; it has also been collected by Clarence Elliott, who found it in flower in January 1928. It is a dioecious shrub. The female flowers are smaller than the males and shorter-stalked. Comber observes that he found it in semi-shady situations where the soil was moist and varying from peaty to loamy in character.

O. pillopillo (C. Gay) Meissn. Daphne pillopillo C. Gay – This species was also introduced by Comber from Chile in 1927. It is closely related to O. andina, but is described as 10 to 30 ft high. It can be distinguished from that species by the glabrousness of its leaves, which are stalkless, oblanceolate, 1 to 3 in. long, 14 to 12 in. wide, dull, pale, rather glaucous green. Judging by wild specimens the young shoots are mostly very downy. Flowers white, very downy outside, 12 in. wide; fruit reddish and purple when ripe. “Pillo-pillo” is the Indian name for this shrub.


Genus

Ovidia

Other species in the genus

[No species article available]