A NOTE ON THE GENUS JOANNESIA 
BY 
Ricuarp Evans ScuuLres 
Joannesia princeps Velloso Alograf. (1790) 199. 
Joannesia insolita Pittier in Bol. Soc. Venez. Cienc. 
Nat. 6, no. 41 (19389) 8. 
In 1989, Dr. Tobias Lasser collected specimens from 
a tree in the yard of an abandoned house at El Peaje, 
along the road out of Caracas towards El Valle in Vene- 
zuela. ‘The tree was determined as belonging to the 
genus Joannesia by Dr. Pittier who sent material to Dr. 
Adolpho Ducke for study. 
Joannesia, had previously been known only through 
J. princeps Vell., from the coastal regions of Brazil near 
Rio de Janeiro, and J. heveoides Ducke, from the cen- 
tral part of the Amazon Valley. The discovery of the 
genus in such a distant and isolated locality as Caracas, 
Venezuela, was, indeed, unexpected. 
Both Pittier and Ducke felt that the Venezuelan ma- 
terial represented a distinct species, possibly allied more 
closely to Joannesia princeps. Pittier, consequently de- 
scribed it as Joannesia insolita. In discussing the novelty, 
he wrote (/oe. cit, 10): **The question still to be resolved 
is ‘How did this, the only known individual of the spe- 
cles, get to its present location’ and also ‘HLlow can one 
explain why, inso many trips through the forests of the 
coastal mountains and others that surround Caracas, none 
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