Coutarea hexandra (Jacq.) K.Schum.

Small trees or shrubs, the twiglets terete, glabrous, relatively smooth, the lenticels often abundant and conspicuous, the branchlets rigid or subarcuate, the nodes usually well spaced. Leaves usually ovate rotund to ovate, 4-12 cm long, 2-6 cm wide, round or occasionally deltoid at the apex, acuminate, the acumen short, subfalcate, acute or more often acuminate, basally rounded, obtuse or truncate, often vaguely inequilateral, the venation immersed or prominulous above, prominulous beneath, the costa slender, the lateral veins 6-12, scarcely arcuate, well spaced, stiffly papyraceous, glabrous above, glabrous to golden pubescent beneath, the hairs curled, scattered along the veins, often tufted in the axils; petioles short, to 1.5 cm long, glabrous or often golden villulose; stipules soon deciduous, widely triangular or compressed hemispherical, 2-4 mm long, acute. Inflorescences terminal and axillary, glabrate or minutely puberulent, the peduncle absent or short, the branches 3-5, often lenticellate, terminated usually by 3-flowered cymules or to single flowers; bracteoles linear subulate or ovate subulate, several located at the base of the pedicel; bracts lanceolate or subulate; pedicels short. Flowers large, showy, hypanthium oblong rotund or oblong, ca. 6 mm long, smooth, puberulent, the calycine cup ca. 1.5 mm long, glabrous within, with patches of oblong glands at the junction of the calycine lobes, these ca. 0.75 mm long, obtuse, the lobes 4-6, subulate, ca. 5.5 mm long, obtuse, marginally pubescent; corolla obovate oblong, slightly falcate and thus zygo-morphic, to 8 cm long, 1.8-3.0 cm wide, obtuse at the apex, attenuate acute at the base, petaloid, scattered pubescent outside, puberulent within, the lobes 2.0-2.5 cm long, obtuse or acute; stamens 6, the anthers linear oblong, 1.7-2.2 cm long, ca. 1.5 mm wide, sagittate at the base, basifixed, the filaments free of the corolla tube, ca. 7.5 cm long; style linear, 7.5-9.5 cm long, ca. 1.5 mm wide, the stigmas 1.2-1.7 cm long, scarcely wider than the style, the ovary wall oblong in cross section, with conspicuous ducts. Fruits capsular, oblong obovoid or ob-ovoid rotund, 2.5-5.0(-7.0) cm long, 2.0-2.8 cm wide, strongly compressed, lig-nose, bisculcate, dark brown, lustrous, glabrous, with numerous white, punctate lenticels; seeds round or oblong, 2-15 mm long, brown, the body 2-5 mm long, alate, the wing membranous, entire or undulate.

Moist soils in alluvial river valleys and near rivers, in both dense, primary forests and the more open, secondary formations, generally preferring more open, sunny positions. Thickets in Panama.

Can be grown by seedlings.