2790 



Leaflets of Philippine Botany 



[Vol. VIII, Art. 115 



Platea fuliginea Elm. n. sp. 



A tree of middle size, its stem 4.5 dm thick, 10 to 15 m 

 high; bark comparatively smooth except for the lenticels; 

 wood soft, easily cutting, whitish throughout, odorless and 

 tasteless, light; branches spreading, freely rebranched, the 

 twigs densely covered with a fulvus or fuligineus stellate 

 tomenturn. Leaves alternatingly scattered, similarly spreading, 

 submembranous, dark dull green above, yellowish gray or 

 green beneath, nearly flat, the sharply acute to acuminate 

 tips slightly recurved, the glabrous upper side nearly ater 

 when dr/, the lower surface avellaneus and fuligineusly 

 finely stellately tornentose, entire, rounded at the base, 

 ovately oblong or merely oblong, variable in size, the larg- 

 er blades 1 dm long and one half as wide; midrib rather 

 prominent beneath, densely covered with groups of fine 

 fuligineus colored stellate hairs, glabrous along the small 

 groove on the upper side; lateral nerves oblique, 7 to 10 

 pairs, similar in prominence and vestiture on the nether 

 surface, tips strongly arching yet scarcely united, reticula- 

 tions faint; petiole 1.5 cm long, fuligineusly pubescent or 

 stellate, flattish on the upper side. Infrutescence erect, 1 

 to 3 cm long; spike stout, light fuligineus tornentose, bear- 

 ing few scattered fruits; pedicel similar in vestiture, usually 

 bracteate; calyx less than 5 mm deep, subcampanulate, 

 united below the middle, otherwise roundly 5-lobed; young 

 fruits ovoidly elongated, smooth, light green except the 

 elongated darker green apex, shining, 1.25 cm long or when 

 mature twice as long and red in color. 



Type specimen number 10613, A. D. E. Elmer, Todaya 

 (Mt. Apo), District of Davao, Mindanao, May, 1909. 



Quite a fine forest tree in good rather moist soil at 

 5000 feet altitude and due south of mount Calelan. Fairly 

 well known to all Bagobos as "Caliso." 



Only critically distinguished from Platea latifolia Blm. 

 by the smaller leaves whose nerves beneath are not "gri- 

 seo-lepidotis." 



