230 



AN UNDESCRIBED HELICONIA IN THE NEW 

 YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN 



By Robert F. Griggs 



^ Bihai geniculata sp. nov. 



Plant about 4 m. tall (stem to base of peduncle 2 m., petiole 

 4-6 dm., blade 12.5 dm.), erect, with the habit of B. Chavipnciana 

 but with only 2-3 leaves to a stalk at a time. Leaf 120-150 

 cm. long, about 30 cm. wide, oblique, narrowed or rounded at the 

 base, acute or suddenly very short-acuminate at the tip, green 

 and glabrous, main veins 10—13 mm. apart. Inflorescence 20— 

 30 cm. long, red, erect, sessile or on a peduncle up to 15 cm. long, 

 of 9-10 bracts, which are of very unequal ages so that the 

 flowers in the lower are in fruit before the upper open. Rachis 

 nearly straight, stiff, the whole inflorescence including pedicels 

 and flowers covered with a thin soft evanescent tomentum. 

 Branch-bracts (distichous in the bud) becoming three-ranked by 

 the twisting of the rachis, horizontally divaricate at anthesis, later 

 reflexed, about 25 mm. apart; the lowest fertile one 15—25 cm. 

 long, 3 cm. around at the widest part, the upper a little shorter, 

 narrowly triangular, straight-sided, scarcely tapering to the very 

 acute tip ; the red of the rachis is continued onto the branch- 

 bracts but they are paler at the base within and without and 

 have an equilateral triangle of yellow, which appears on their 

 sides near the point of attachment and extends nearly to the 

 bottom when young, later disappearing so that they are entirely 

 red after anthesis. Flowers 12—20 in each bract but of very 

 diverse age, so that only about two are in season at once, closely 

 appressed into the channel of the bracts until near anthesis, when 

 they become erect by the upward bending of the pedicel, but 

 quickly deflexed again by a sharp bend of about 90° appearing 

 in the perianth above the ovulary, whence the name geniculata ; 

 free sepal always on the lower side after deflection and more 

 strongly bent, forming a decided lip ; pedicels and ovulary greenish- 

 yellow, sepals yellow, as are the petals except for a bright patch 

 of dark green on the lower edges of the two exposed by the 

 reflexed lip. 



The type is growing in the greenhouses of the New York 

 Botanical Garden, 120. ig668, and herbarium sheets are preserved 

 in the same institution. Its native habitat is unknown. It came 

 from the Department of Parks of the Borough of the Bronx in 



