Flora of Papua New Guinea 
Lae National Herbarium 
10088 Rubiaceae 
Psychotria amplithyrsa Valeton 
East Sepik Province, vicinity of Langu village, alluvial forest on flood 
plain of the Sanchi tributary, Sepik River, elev. _40 m, near 4° 11’ S, 
142° 44’ E. 
near 10084; woody climber, entirely glabrous; branchlets terete, 
completely herbaceous and smooth near the apex, terminal bud 
ensheathed by the stipule; stipules tubular, furrowed down each side 
but fused all around, 34 mm x 5 mm, smooth, approx, cylindric, 
tapering only slightly toward the summit, fugacious; leaves opposite, 
fleshy, succulent but brittle if flexed, adaxial surface shining green x 
abaxially shining light green, lamina subelliptic, average 10.5 cm x 5.5 
cm, apex acuminate, base rounded - or often obtuse and very 
briefly/abruptly cuneate; petiole 2 cm, smooth and fleshy, flattened 
above; the nodes with a circumscissile stipular scar, etorulose; leaf 
penninerved, laterals 8-9 pairs, sharply arcuate at the margins, lacking 
domatia, main veins equally and weakly embossed on both sides, 
reticulum hidden (in vivo); flowers not seen; fructescence effusely 
paniculate, >25 cm, pedunculate or not, trichotomous at each 
branching point, the rachides long (to >20 cm), also ramifying in 3’s, all 
axes smoothly glabrous, white, fleshy, ebracteate; drupes subglobose, 
ellipsoid, or obovoid, 6 mm long when ripe, sessile, pericarp white, 
glabrous, apex with the disk umbonate, pulp sparse and watery; 
pyrenes 2, flat on the commissural face, dorsally 3-sulcate with 4 
verrucose ridges, testa bony, seed with a nonruminate interior. 
Waskuk name-singla.’ The drupe is used to bait fishing hooks. 
coll: W. Takeuchi 10088 
date: August 1 8, 1 994 
det. WT 
