Sarmienta

Full name and orig. publication: Sarmienta Ruiz & Pav., Prodr. 4 (1794), nom. cons.

Etymology: Named in honor of Martino Sarmiento (1695-1772), a Spanish Benedictine monk, philologist and naturalist.

Synonym: Urceolaria Huth (1758), nom. rejic.

Infrafamilial position: Gesnerioideae-Coronanthereae-Mitrariinae (Woo et al. 2011, Weber et al. 2013).

Description: Suffrutescent creeper or climber, usually epiphytic. Stems slender, flexuous, sparingly branched, rooting at the basal nodes. Leaves small, opposite, subsessile, ovate to suborbicular, rather fleshy, entire or obscurely crenate, glabrous, nerves obscure. Flowers axillary, solitary, pendulous. Sepals free, linear to lanceolate. Corolla scarlet; tube elongate, strongly constricted at the base, inflated in the middle and again narrowed below the limb; limb oblique, subregular, lobes rounded, spreading. Fertile stamens 2, the posterior ones; filaments inserted near corolla base, slender, long exserted; anthers elliptical, free, the sterile anterior stamens with long filaments and clavate tips or minute anthers, included; fifth stamen a short staminode. Disc ring-shaped, adnate to ovary. Ovary superior; style long, slender, exserted; stigma small, simple. Fruit a fleshy berry.

Chromosome number: 2n = ± 74.

Type and only species: Sarmienta repens Ruiz & Pav., nom. illeg. (type) = S. scandens (J.D. Brandis) Pers.

Distribution: S Chile and Chiloe Island.

Ecology: Occurring in cool rain forest, growing on damp or mossy rocks and tree trunks and branches of living and dead trees (Salinas .

Notes:
(1) Together with Asteranthera and Mitraria, Sarmienta is one of the three monospecific genera of Gesneriaceae occurring in temperate South America with mild to cool, humid climate.
(2) It is the only genus of neotropical Gesneriaceae with a diandrous androecium.
(3) Regarding the growth pattern, Sarmienta is a true epiphyte, with the seeds germinating and rooting on the trunk of trees and never gaining ground contact (Salinas et al. 2010). The same pattern is found in Mitraria, while Asteranthera is a climber germinating at and rooting in the soil.
(4) The bright red flowers suggest pollination by birds. Probably the same holds true as is said for Asteranthera.

Selected references: Wiehler, Selbyana 6: 160 (1983); Zollner, Palmengarten 55: 25-27 (1991), illustr.; Woo et al., Int. J. Pl. Scie. Sci. 172(3): 434-457 (2011), rev. Coronanthereae, biogeogr.; Salinas et al., Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 117-127 (2010), growth patterns.

Tax. details, cytology, and bibliography: Gesneriaceae Resource Centre (GRC). Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.

Page content and update responsibility/contact: Anton Weber.
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