Cyathea manniana (Sampled Red List Index Plants of Madagascar)

Cyathea manniana

Plant descriptions ²

Trunk 0.3–9 m tall, 10–15 cm in diameter, dark brown to almost black, throughout with long-decurrent appressed spiny stipe bases, in older trees the lower stem eventually smooth. Fronds 5–10 in number, to 4 m long; stipe brown, 25–90 cm long, bearing conical warts or black spines 2–4 mm long; scales medium to dark reddish brown, to 20 mm long and 6 mm wide near the base, margins fragile with irregularly projecting oblique thin-walled cells. Lamina dark green, 2-pinnate, 3-pinnatifid or 3-pinnate, 0.9–3 m long, 0.9–1.3 m wide; basal pinnae not or little reduced, long stalked; rachis spiny towards its base, with (12–)35–40 falcate pinnae on each side; largest pinnae 45–75 cm long; largest pinnules 6–13 cm long and 1–2.2 cm wide, ± glaucous beneath, basal pair of lobes free, remaining pinnules lobed almost to the costa, the lobes crenate; costules 2.5–4 mm apart; veins 10–13 pairs, lower and middle ones of large pinnules twice forked, distal ones forked or simple. Scales and hairs on pinnules: lower surface of costae at first covered by broad flat light- to mid-brown scales of all sizes, the larger ones with a dark median patch, all with fringed edges, the scales deciduous on old fronds, grading to a usually small number of short contorted hairs of variable length and narrow hair-like scales; lower surface of costules scaly and hairy as costae. Sori close to costules; indusia light brown, broadly cup-shaped with a ± permanent smooth edge or rather one-sided due to splitting; paraphyses short and slender.

Elevation ²

Up to 1 500 m.

Similar species ²

Syn. Cyathea engleri ; Cyathea laurentiorum ; Cyathea preussii ; Cyathea sellae ; Cyathea usambarensis.

Reference ²

Flora of Tropical East Africa, page 1, (2005) Author: Peter J. Edwards

Sources and Credits

More Info

iNat Map

Taxonomy:family	Cyatheaceae
Plant growth form	Fern
Vegetation	Humid forest

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