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Musa haekkinenii
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Abstract
A new banana species, Musa haekkinenii, is described from northern Vietnam. It differs notably from a well-known ornamental species, M. coccinea, by inflorescence features and leaf blade shape and especially the habit, shape, size and color of the male bracts of the inflorescences and male bud shape. A mixed watercolor and ink plate is provided for the new taxon and an identification key to species of Musa sect. Callimusa is included, along with a note comparing the morphology of the seven Indo-Chinese species.
Keywords: Botanical art, Callimusa, Indochina, Red River
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FIGURE 1. Musa haekkinenii N.S.Lý & Haev.
A—habit; B—cross-section of petiole; C—old leaf base; D—old leaf apex; E—young leaf base; F—young leaf apex; G—young female inflorescence; H—male inflorescence with many persistent bracts; I—inner surface of male bract; J—outer surface of male bract; K—male flower, ventral view; L—male flower, dorsal view; M—compound tepal; N—free tepal; O—female flower: ovary, compound tepal, free tepal, filaments, style and stigma; P—lateral view of male flower; Q—close-up of filaments, anthers, style, and stigma of male flower; R—un-fertilized fruit with persistent perianth.
Scale bars: A = 50 cm; B = 1 cm; C–F = 20 cm; G = 10 cm; H = 5 cm; I–S = 2 cm. Based on dried materials, spirit materials (P) and photos of TH–508 and Lý–518.
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Musa haekkinenii N.S.Lý & Haev., sp. nov.
Similar to M. coccinea, but differs by its leaf shape and size (lamina oblong-elliptic, c. 112 × 40 cm, one side pointed and the other rounded at base, the apex truncate vs. oblong, c. 100 × 25 cm, rounded on both base and apex), persistentnon-withering male bracts on the inflorescence axis that are denser and longer (up to 40 bracts, each 7.5–9.2 × 2–3 cm vs. c. 20 bracts c. 7 × 3 cm), and differences in the shape, color and habit of male bracts (ovate, bright orange-red, recurving downward to touch the erect axis vs. ovoid, deep scarlet, ascending).
Type:— VIETNAM. Phú Thọ Province: Phú Thọ District, Phú Hộ Commune, 21°27’11”N, 105°15’16”E, 54 m, 19 November 2008, T. Haevermans et al. 508 (Holotype P! (incl. spirit material), isotypes VNM!, H!).
Distribution and habitat:— Musa haekkinenii is known only from cultivated material, which bore flowers and infructescences with unfertilized fruits when it was observed and collected in December 2008 and December 2010. The prevailing climate in areas where the cultivated plants were growing is monsoon tropical, with an annual average rainfall ranging from 1560 mm (Sơn La) to 1850 mm (Phú Thọ) and an annual average temperature from 18.5°C in Sơn La to 23.1°C in Phú Thọ (Nguyễn et al. 2000).
Conservation status:— This species is so far known only as cultivated plants in Phú Thọ and Sơn La province. Because no data are available on its distribution in the wild, Musa haekkinenii is provisionally considered as Data Deficient (DD) according to the IUCN (2001) Red List criteria and categories.
Etymology:— Our new species is named in honor of Markku Häkkinen, a world expert on banana taxonomy and associate researcher at the Botany Unit, Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki, Finland. He has made remarkable contributions during more than 30 years of study on Musaceae and has conducted many collecting trips to Southeast Asia. The diacritic sign on the letter “ä” in his family name has been transliterated into Latin as “ae”, as recommended in Article 60.4 of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (McNeill et al. 2006), in spite of this being a latinisation of that letter from Germanic, not Fenno-Ugric languages.
Vernacular name:— This species is locally referred to as Chuối rừng hoa đỏ, “Chuối rừng” meaning wild banana and “hoa đỏ” meaning red inflorescence.
Ngoc-Sam Lý, C.-K. Lê, T.-D. Trieu, Agathe Haevermans, Porter P. Lowry II and Thomas Haevermans. 2013. A Distinctive New Wild Banana Species (
Musa, Musaceae) from northern Vietnam.
Phytotaxa 75:33-42. DOI:
10.11646/phytotaxa.75.1.3