Hyacinthoides Paivae

''Hyacinthoides paivae'' is a species of bluebell in the genus ''Hyacinthoides'' native to the north-western part of the Iberian Peninsula. It lives chiefly in shady woodlands, and grows up to tall, producing a cluster of up to 18 pale blue flowers in spring. It was formally described in 1996, having previously been identified as belonging to the related species '' H. italica''.

Description

''Hyacinthoides paivae'' is a perennial plant which grows from bulbs that are typically × . Each bulb produces 4–7 (more rarely 2–12) basal leaves, each long and wide. The stems are long, and bear an inflorescence comprising 6–18 flowers in a multilateral raceme. Each flower is attached by a pedicel long, and is itself long by wide. ''H. paivae'' can be told apart from ''H. italica'' by its broader leaves and larger flowers; ''H. hispanica'' differs in having longer, narrower, unscented and bell-shaped flowers.

Distribution and ecology

''Hyacinthoides paivae'' is endemic to the north-western part of the Iberian Peninsula, including western parts of Galicia (A Coruña, Ourense and Pontevedra provinces) and north-western parts of Portugal ( Beira Litoral, Douro Litoral, Minho and Trás-os-Montes provinces). Material of an unidentified species from the Sierra de la Demanda, a small mountain range on the border between Burgos province and La Rioja, matches ''H. paivae'' genetically.

''H. paivae'' occurs in oak woodland and pine woods growing over ''Ulex'', ''Erica cinerea'' and ''Cistus'' spp., as well as other shady habitats. It also occurs occasionally on coastal cliffs, and in mown meadows. The typical flowering period is March and April, although it can be as late as June in upland areas, such as Monte Pindo.

Taxonomic history

In 1990, bluebells assigned to the species ''Hyacinthoides italica'' were reported from north-western Spain. Later analyses of the species morphology demonstrated that the plants did not belong to ''H. italica'', which is only otherwise found near the French–Italian border. Instead, it was realised that they represented a new species, which was named ''Hyacinthoides paivae'' by Santiago Ortiz and Juan Rodríguez-Oubiña in 1996, the specific epithet ' honouring the Portuguese botanist Jorge Paiva.

The holotype, a specimen from Dumbría, A Coruña province, Spain, is held at the herbarium of the '; isotypes are also kept there, and at the University of Coimbra, the ' and ' in Madrid, the ' in Pontevedra, and at the Natural History Museum and Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in London.

Ortiz and Rodríguez-Oubiña initially placed the species in "''Hyacinthoides'' sect. ''Somera''", but more recent molecular phylogenetic analysis could not confirm any of the existing sections in the genus, and placed it instead in an informal group alongside '' H. non-scripta'', '' H. hispanica'' and '' H. cedretorum''.

References

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{{Taxonbar, from=Q5952348

paivae
Plants described in 1996
Flora of Spain
Flora of Portugal
Endemic flora of the Iberian Peninsula