Abstract
A new herb species of Urticaceae, Laportea stolonifera B. L. Bhellum & B. Singh, is described and illustrated from a restricted habitat of subtropical forest of Northwest Himalaya, India. The new taxon is vegetatively similar to Laportea ovalifolia (Schumach. & Thonn.) Chew, an African endemic species and Laportea interrupta (L.) Chew but differs by phenotypic characters such as cordate leaves, unbranched inflorescence, stem hairs types, linear cystoliths with varying shapes, and presence of 2 to 3 stolons arising from basal node of stems. The similarity with the allied species is due to similar habitats occupancy, but isolated geographically from each other. Laportea stolonifera is assessed as Endangered, and the population data, ecological parameters and associated taxa are also presented. A key to the genus Laportea is prepared for India has been presented in the text.Bangladesh J. Plant Taxon. 23(2): 189-194, 2016 (December)
Highlights
The nettle family, Urticaceae Juss. (1789: 400), comprised of 1465 species and 54 genera in the world (TPL, 2016), includes herbs, shrubs, small trees, and vines distributed primarily in tropical, subtropical and temperate belts (Mabberley, 2008)
While studying the floristic composition of Jammu and Kashmir (India) in Northwestern Himalaya, and during recent plant collection trips to Jasrota forest, samples from three interesting populations of tribe Urticeae were collected which upon critical investigation revealed to be a new species of the genus Laportea Gaudich
Diagnosis: The new species, Laportea stolonifera, is highly similar to the African endemic, L. ovalifolia, and some characters related with L. interrupta, but differ from them by the presence of cordate leaves, unbranched inflorescence, three types of stem mild hairs, linear cystolith with varying shapes, and salient characters of 2 or 3 stolons arising from each basal node of stems
Summary
The nettle family, Urticaceae Juss. (1789: 400), comprised of 1465 species and 54 genera in the world (TPL, 2016), includes herbs, shrubs, small trees, and vines distributed primarily in tropical, subtropical and temperate belts (Mabberley, 2008). While studying the floristic composition of Jammu and Kashmir (India) in Northwestern Himalaya, and during recent plant collection trips to Jasrota forest, samples from three interesting populations of tribe Urticeae were collected which upon critical investigation revealed to be a new species of the genus Laportea Gaudich. The genus Laportea comprise of 25 species (TPL, 2016), distributed in Africa and Madagascar with a few pantropic species (Chew, 1989). After thorough scrutiny of the specimens, literature survey and geographic distribution, authors found that the unknown species is new to science. Is quite different from the species described in published literatures (Ramaswamy and Razi, 1973; Fyson, 1974; Bennet, 1987; Chew, 1989; Sharma, 2010).
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