Palicourea triphylla Dc.

Shrubs or trees to 7 m tall, the branchlets terete, smooth, glabrous, usually constricted below the nodes. Leaves 2 or 3 at a node, lanceolate, often falcate, often 4 times longer than wide, to 26 cm long, to 8 cm wide, acute, usually cuspidate, the cusp to 1.5 cm long, acute or cuneate at the base, usually slightly inequilateral, the costa prominulous above, prominent beneath, the lateral veins 12-16, arcuate, prominulous or immersed above, prominulous beneath, the in-tervenal areas spreading reticulate, papyraceous, usually concolorous, puberulent above especially on the costa, often farinose above from persistent hair bases, villosulose beneath especially on the veins, often farinose in the intervenal areas; petioles almost absent or to 1.5 cm long, often curved; stipules connate, the sheath short, to 2 mm long, the awns 2, erect, subulate, to 12 mm long, stiff, marginally puberulent. Inflorescences terminal, solitary, exceeding the upper-most leaves, to 30 cm long, the peduncle rarely absent, to 15 cm long, often as long as the floriferous portion, stout, puberulent, thrysoid paniculate, the branch-es numerous, stiffly ascending, the flowers numerous. Flowers with the hypan-thium subrotund to cuneate, ca. 1 mm long, puberulent, the calycine cup ca. 1 mm long, glabrous within, the teeth reduced to 5 irregular erosulose points; co-rolla orange or yellow, the tube narrowly cylindrical, subturgid at the base, ca. 12.5 mm long, densely puberulent outside, villose within at the mouth and with a few hairs at the base of the tube, the lobes 5, short, ca. 1.5 mm long, obtuse, not cucullate; stamens 5, the anthers narrowly oblong, ca. 3 mm long, obtuse, dorsifixed, the filaments short, ca. 1.5 mm long, attached near upper 2/3 of the

It is a tropical plant.