A Neotropical Savanna

Several of the living fence post species are in bloom now. Living fence posts are fence posts that have sprouted after becoming a part of a fence. They can be obvious posts with a few sprouts coming out the top, or they can have grown into full size trees while still serving as fence posts.

The yellow-flowered macano was a living fence tree described last year, and the “little machete” or machetito that we’re looking at today and that is shown below is in the same family – the Fabaceae or bean family.

The Flowers
Surely you can tell from the flower where the common name came from – the red petal looks like the blade of a machete and the calyx (the cup of sepals at the base of the petals) looks like the machete handle.

While looking at the flower, we can ask ourselves to which of the three large groups within the immense Fabaceae family this plant belongs. You may recall that the three groups, or subfamilies, are based on flowers that look like 1) peas, 2) mimosa (flowers like soft spiny balls), or 3) Caesalpinia-like flowers, which are brightly colored and showy flowers such as found in Flamboyant trees.

So which is this? Since the flowers are definitely not soft spiny balls, we are left with peas and with the showy flowers of the Caesalpinioideae subfamily. If you go to Wayne’s World, you’ll find a discussion of this group of trees, which are called in English “coral trees.” He has dissected one of these flowers here to show how this machete blade is really part of a pea flower, with all the remaining parts being reduced.

Let’s defer further thoughts on the flower for now – we will shortly look at them more closely to see just why just the one part of the pea flower should be conspicuous.

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This time of year in western Panama, you’re likely to see trees with yellow flowers in bloom. Here in Chiriqui, we see them along the side of the Interamericana and also along the road between Dolega and David. Two species of yellow-topped trees are conspicuous in January, and each represents a different family. (A third yellow-flowered tree blooming this time of year is a living fence tree, the macano, featured earlier.)

The image on the left, a young tree, is one you’re likely to see in the drier parts of Chiriqui. The one on the right is seen in dry to very humid areas of our province.

From a distance – and certainly from these pictures that include the tree trunks – you may not be able to tell how different the flowers are. But they are. If you have binoculars, or a zoom on your camera, you’ll see the flowers of the first tree are shaped like a buttercup. The flowers of the second tree occur in big clusters, and each flower is frilly.

These are the poroporo or the buttercup tree (on the left) and the Cortez amarillo or the yellow Cortez tree (on the right).

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The leaves of the Clusia tree caught my eye the first time we walked around the abandoned pastureland that was to become our property. They are shiny, attractive, and succulent-like. Botanists say the leaves are “leathery” and I suppose it was that leather-like texture that caused someone to try scratching a word on the leaf. Not only is it possible to do that, but the word will remain as a scar on the leaf for the rest of the leaf’s life. For this reason, it is sometimes called the “autograph” tree. The local name for our common Clusia is copé, literally translated as “I won.” I wonder what is won under a Clusia tree.

Once you’ve lived among these trees, though, you’re able to see their beautiful flowers and exotic fruits. I began to want to know which species of Clusia we had. There are 300 species of Clusia in the new world tropica (Maas), but only five species listed in the Tree Atlas of Panama, which made me think I might be able to discover which species we had. However, despite the excellent illustrations in the Tree Atlas, I was not confident of any identification.

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Adjacent to the Davilla plant mentioned in the last post is a guava plant whose species I do not know. It’s in flower now, and I’ve been noticing that it produces a new flower every day, and overnight the petals wilt and the stamens (pollen-bearing male parts) begin to fall off.

Since my curiosity was peaked by the apparently rapid opening of the Davilla flower, I decided to watch the guava closely while waiting for a Davilla bud to decide to open.

Here’s what I saw this morning, between 6:54 AM and 8:05 AM. It took about an hour and a quarter for the flower to go from a bud to a fully open flower. (Click on any image to enlarge.)

And then, when I returned after 3 in the afternoon, here was the fully mature flower.

Now go back and look at all the images again, paying attention to the flower on the left of the blooming one. What happens to it is what is going to happen to today’s blooming flower tomorrow. First the petals wilt and the stamens begin falling away By mid-afternoon all the stamens are gone. Only the pistil (female part) remains and you can see the fruit beginning to develop beneath it.

Ain’t nature grand?

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