Hypericum humboldtianum (Nomenclature)
Shrub or shrublet (0.05-)0.1-0.75 m tall, erect or decumbent at the base to ascending, with branches pseudo-dichotomous and divergent or lateral and strict, sometimes condensed in leaf axils, not from the base. Stems orange-brown, 4-lined and ancipitous when young, eventually terete, cortex exfoliating in strips; internodes 2.5-14 mm long. Leaves sessile or shortly pseudopetiolate with pseudopetiole up to 0.5 mm long, spreading from above pseudopetiole to subappressed, not tetrastichous, deciduous above base or above pseudopetiole before fading; lamina 6-13 x 1-2.3 mm, narrowly oblong or narrowly elliptic to oblanceolate, plane or incurved, not or slightly cucullate, midrib slightly prominent to impressed beneath, concolorous, sometimes glaucous, coriaceous or subcoriaceous; apex acute to obtuse, not mucronate, base angustate, the pseudopetiole sheathing, free or united with stem-line apex to form narrow interfoliar ridge; basal vein 1, without or with obscure lateral branches, tertiary reticulation absent; laminar glands dense, impressed above. Inflorescence l(3-12)-flowered, the branching dichasial or pseudo- dichotomous or mixed; peduncle and pedicels 3-4(-7) mm long, not incrassate upwards; upper leaves transitional. Flowers c. 15 mm in diam., stellate. Sepals 14.5-16.5 x 1.3-2.2 mm, elliptic-oblong to oblanceolate, acute; veins 3-5, not branched, midrib not prominent; glands linear below and punctiform in upper l/3- l/2 or wholly punctiform. Petals bright yellow, 6-8 x 3.5-5 mm, c. 1.3 x sepals, obovate; apiculus obtuse; glands linear, distally punctiform. Stamens 30-50, longest c.5.5 mm long, 0.6-0.7 x petals. Ovary 1.5-2 x 1 mm, ovoid to cylindric; styles 3, 2-3 mm long, 1-1.5 x ovary, narrowly spreading; stigmas broadly capitate. Capsule 4-6.5 x 2-3 mm, cylindric-ellipsoid, equalling sepals. Seeds0.5-0.6 mm long, ecarinate; testa finely reticulate-scalariform.
Thickets and open slopes of the paramo; (1820) 2500-3500 m.
Colombia (Valle de Cauca to Norte de Santandér), Venezuela (Mérida).
H. humboldtianum varies continuously north-eastward from typical 'H thymifolium' (Cundinamarca, Cauca, Valle), with spreading leaves, no axillary branchlets, few or no lateral branches, and a 1-flowered pseudo-dichotomous inflorescence, to 'H. jussiaei var. saturejifolium' (Cundinamarca to Mérida), with appressed leaves, axillary branchlets, numerous lateral branches, and 3-12-flowered dichasial inflorescences. Its nearest relative would appear to be H. callacallanum (Peru), which is more bushy and has 3(4)-nerved sessile leaves and larger flowers. Kunth's H. dichotomum, was based on a Humboldt specimen that is labelled as having been collected in 'Saraguru' (i.e. south Ecuador, Loja, Saraguro). This name remained unpublished (probably because Kunth realised that it would be a later homonym of H. dichotomum Lam.) until Keller discovered a specimen so named in Herb. Humboldt (B) and described it. The photographs of this specimen show that it clearly belongs to the 'H.jussiaei' form of H. humboldtianum, not (as the cited locality suggests) to near H. callacallanum. Since no further material of this species has been collected in the botanically relatively well known Saraguro area, and since the species is otherwise unknown south of south-central Colombia, it seems possible that Keller was in error in localising the Berlin specimen and that the plant was actually collected in Colombia by Humboldt & Bonpland. At any rate, the occurrence of H. humboldtianum in Ecuador must, for the present, remain extremely doubtful