ADDISONIA 23 
(Plate 172) 
APHELANDRA NITENS 
Shining Aphelandra 
Native of Colombia 
Family ACANTHACEAE AcANTHUS Family 
A phelandra nitens Hook. f. Bot. Mag. pl. 4761. 1868. 
This is one of the most attractive members of a family furnishing 
many showy varieties for the conservatories. In flower the bright 
scarlet-vermilion of its blossoms makes it conspicuous in any 
collection, but its beauty is not confined alone to flowering time, 
for the foliage is striking in the richness of its color, a deep shining 
green above contrasting with the vinous purple of the lower surface. 
Its home is in’ Colombia; it was first known from Guayaquil, from 
which place specimens were sent about 1867 by Richard Pearce who 
was on a collecting trip for the Messrs. Veitch. Plants from this 
source flowered in May, 1868, in the Royal Exotic Nurseries, at 
Chelsea, and the species was described from this material. The 
plant in the collection of the New York Botanical Garden, from 
which the illustration was prepared, was secured from the conser- 
vatories of Mrs. Finley J. Shepard in 1919. 
Its successful cultivation requires the conditions of a stove 
house, that is one where the temperature and humidity are high. 
It is readily propagated by cuttings; it is said to produce seed if 
placed in a cooler and drier house when in flower. 
The family to which this plant belongs is a large one and widely 
distributed, mainly in tropical regions. The genus Aphelandra . 
is confined to America, extending from Mexico southward to Peru 
and Brazil, being especially well represented in the Andean regions. 
Besides the present species there are six or seven others in culti- 
vation. 
The shining aphelandra, under greenhouse cultivation, is an 
erect herb, usually of dwarf and compact habit, with thick leaves 
of a deep green above and vinous purple beneath, and a spike of 
searlet-vermilion flowers e green stems are stout and round, 
and are sparingly branched. ae ovate leaves are opposite, up 
to six inches long, with the margin recurved and the apex acute; 
the broad base is abruptly canoes into a petiole a half inch long 
or less. The erect spike is usually about six inches long; the green 
sect bracts are ovate or elliptic and acute, an inch to an inch and 
