Passiflora putumayensis Killip (1938: 532)

Kuethe, J. R., Cornejo, Xavier, Garzón-Suárez, Henry X., Jiménez, Marco M., Wettges, Martin, Magdalena, Carlos, Mejía-Pazos, Nicanor, Flores, Juan Carlos Espín & Decoux, Jose, 2025, Passionflower trees of Ecuador: revising the presence of Passiflora subg. Astrophea (Passifloraceae) and including resolution to the P. putumayensis and P. macrophylla taxonomic complexes, Phytotaxa 697 (2), pp. 147-165 : 157

4. Passiflora putumayensis Killip (1938: 532) ( Figure 4 )

Type:— COLOMBIA. Putumayo: Comisario del Putumayo, collected at La Tortuga, 01°47’47”N 74°46’25”W, May 1935 (fl.), H. García Barriga 4630 (holotype: US 1594215!; isotype: COL 0002969 !) .

Notes:— Passiflora putumayensis is among the smaller of the Astropheas with heights generally limited to 1 m to 1.5 m tall. Ellsworth Killip (1938) described the species based on a single specimen ( García Barriga 4630) from the La Tortuga region in Putumayo Department, Colombia, and specifically noted on the lustrous, thin leaves with flattened nervation and narrowing near to the apex. He also noted the denticulate opercular structure, although compared this species only to other Colombian highland species such as P. schultzei Harms (1929: 808) or P. engleriana . In the Flora of Ecuador ( Holm-Nielsen et al., 1988), erroneously included collections of P. putumayensis in their treatment for “ Passiflora arborea ”, here designated P. dendroidea sp.nov. Recent living collections (i.e. Olander 1999, Kuethe 2009, 2022, Rome 2014, Clark 2024), including the first of which introducing the species in cultivation, helped widen the understanding of this species in relation to other arborescent P. supersect. Astrophea . Visualizing accessions from various collections across Ecuador and into Perú, notable differences are apparent between the (type-specific) Putumayan & north Ecuadorean accessions, and those from said far-flung collections, two of which here now described as their own taxonomic entities (next two entries).

Unlike many of the other free-standing Passiflora subg. Astrophea , this species exhibits excessive inflorescences that can be intricately bifurcated, carrying 4–9 flowers per peduncle.The outer corona is slightly wavy (not dolabriform), white basally and deep yellow apically. This species stands out for its relatively long and filamentose inner series, being distinctly deep yellow throughout and 3–5 mm long. The operculum, which is represented by a thick, filamentous to fleshy (denticulate) barrier around the base of the androgynophore, is similarly coloured with a clear, yellowish tip, making it stand out among the P. subg. Astrophea of this alliance. Within Ecuador, P. putumayensis is restricted to the north-eastern Andean-Amazonian transitional forests of Sucumbíos and Napo provinces where it grows in the understory of dense tropical wet forest at elevations between 1200 and 1900 m above sea level.

Figures

FIGURE 4. Detail on Passiflora putumayensis. Here seen along the slopes of the Reventador Volcano in north Ecuador. A) Habit and inflorescence. Note the intricately bifurcated peduncle carrying up to 9 flowers per preduncle. B) Detail of the flower, showing the slighly wavy and elongated corona. C) A longitudinal of the flower. Note the yellow filiform inner series and yellow-tipped operculum. Photo courtesy by J.R. Kuethe (B) and Ron Boender (A, C).