Sonerila calcicola (Melastomataceae), a new karst dwelling species from Northern Thailand
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ISSN: 0075-5974 (print) ISSN: 1874-933X (electronic)
Sonerila calcicola (Melastomataceae), a new karst dwelling species from Northern Thailand Jarearnsak Sae Wai1,2
& Jer-Ming Hu1
Summary. Sonerila calcicola J.Wai & J.M.Hu, a new species discovered from the limestone karst area of Tak province, Northern Thailand is here described and illustrated. Photographs, illustration, distribution map and comparison with the morphologically similar species, S. parishii Stapf, are also provided. Sonerila calcicola differs from S. parishii in having stout, succulent stems with a denser indumentum, creamy or yellowish white anthers, smaller hypanthium and ovary. This new species is confined to limestone substrate. Key Words. Limestone flora, new taxon, Sonerileae, taxonomy.
Introduction The genus Sonerila was first established by Roxburgh (1814) and validated by Roxburgh (1820). Sonerila belongs to the tribe Sonerileae, family Melastomataceae (Triana 1866; Hooker 1867; Cogniaux 1891; Cellinese 1999). This genus is clearly distinct from other putatively related genera by having trimerous flowers, stamens without distinct anther connective (Cellinese 1999; Renner et al. 2001; Chen & Renner 2007). The acrodromous venation is commonly found in the members of Melastomataceae, but some species of Sonerila appear to have pinnate (eucamptodromous) venation, e.g. S. bokorense S.H.Cho & Y.D.Kim (Cho et al. 2015), a character that is quite uncommon in the family (except for Memecylon). Phylogenetic analysis has shown that Sonerila is a well-supported monophyletic group, and the sister clade may perhaps be Sarcopyramis Wall. (Zhou et al. 2019a), or Phyllagathis Blume (Zhou et al. 2019b). About 250 species names of Sonerila have been published (IPNI 2019). However, many of those names are not accepted, and it is estimated that there are roughly about 175 species of Sonerila distributed in tropical and subtropical Asia from India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, South China, Taiwan, Myanmar, Indochina, Thailand, throughout the Malesia region (Lundin 1983; Cellinese 1997; Cellinese & Renner 1997; Lundin & Nordenstam 2009). In recent years, new species of Sonerila have been discovered and described from poorly explored areas, especially from India (Deepthikumary & Pandurangan 2016; Narayanan et al. 2017; Soumya & Maya 2016; Soumya et al. 2017; Resmi et al. 2018; Mathew et al. 2019; Murugesan et al. 2019) and Borneo (Lin et al. 2015; Lin 2018).
In Thailand, the genus Sonerila is mostly confined to acidic soils in non-limestone outcroups, evergreen lowland and montane forests. So far only one species, S. tenera Royle (1835) has been recorded in both non-limestone and limestone areas. Thirteen species of Sonerila were treated in the Flora of Thailand (Renner et al. 2001), and later Suddee et al. (2014) added one more new species from the eastern part of Thailand. Additional new species can be expected to be found in poorly explored areas, especially in the Dawna range along the Thailand-Myanmar Border. During the preparation of a new taxonomic revision o
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