''Psittacanthus robustus'' is a species of Neotropical

mistletoe Mistletoe is the common name for obligate hemiparasitic plants in the order Santalales. They are attached to their host tree or shrub by a structure called the haustorium, through which they extract water and nutrients from the host plant. ...

in the family

Loranthaceae Loranthaceae, commonly known as the showy mistletoes, is a family of flowering plants. It consists of about 75 genera and 1,000 species of woody plants, many of them hemiparasites. The three terrestrial species are ''Nuytsia floribunda'' (the W ...

, which is found in

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...

, and

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

Description

Initially, branches are erect, but adult branches are pendulous. Branch cross-sections are square. Leaves are petiolate and obtuse at both base and apex. Inflorescences are both terminal and axillary, consisting of umbels of yellow to orange triads (flowers in groups of three). The fruit is light green colored when immature but when ripe the colour changes to black, and looks somewhat like an

olive The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'', meaning 'European olive' in Latin, is a species of small tree or shrub in the family Oleaceae, found traditionally in the Mediterranean Basin. When in shrub form, it is known as ''Olea europaea'' ...

. Its

seed A seed is an embryonic plant enclosed in a protective outer covering, along with a food reserve. The formation of the seed is a part of the process of reproduction in seed plants, the spermatophytes, including the gymnosperm and angiospe ...

s have 3

cotyledon A cotyledon (; ; ; , gen. (), ) is a significant part of the embryo within the seed of a plant, and is defined as "the embryonic leaf in seed-bearing plants, one or more of which are the first to appear from a germinating seed." The numb ...

s and sticky substance inside.

Taxonomy

''P. robustus'' was first described by

Martius Martius may refer to: * Martius (month) the month of March on the ancient Roman calendar * Campus Martius, the "Field of Mars" in ancient Rome * Telo Martius, an ancient name for Toulon, France People * Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius (1794–1 ...

in 1829 as ''Loranthus robustus'', and in 1830, he assigned it to a new genus ''

Psittacanthus ''Psittacanthus'', also parrot-flower, is a plant genus in the family Loranthaceae. It is a type of mistletoe native from central Mexico southwards to Central America and parts of South America.Vázquez Collazo, I. & Geils, B.W. 2002. It differ ...

''.

Distribution

It has been found in the Northern Amazon, in Brazil North, Brazil Northeast, Brazil Southeast, Brazil West-Central, Colombia, Guyana, and Venezuela, in Amazonian rainforests,

Caatinga Caatinga (, ) is a type of semi-arid tropical vegetation, and an ecoregion characterized by this vegetation in interior northeastern Brazil. The name "Caatinga" is a Tupi word meaning "white forest" or "white vegetation" (''caa'' = forest, v ...

, the Central Brazilian Savanna, and the

Atlantic Rainforest The Atlantic Forest ( pt, Mata Atlântica) is a South American forest that extends along the Atlantic coast of Brazil from Rio Grande do Norte state in the northeast to Rio Grande do Sul state in the south and inland as far as Paraguay and the ...

Ecology

Three species of birds have been found eating and excreting the seeds. The most common is'' Tersina viridis viridis'' ( swallow tanager), but also the cinnamon-tanager, ''Schystoclamys ruficapillus ruficapillus'', and the sayaca-tanager, ''

Thraupis sayaca The sayaca tanager (''Thraupis sayaca'') is a species of bird in the family Thraupidae, the tanagers. It is a common resident in northeastern, central, and southeastern Brazil ( pt, sanhaço or ), and Bolivia, Paraguay, Uruguay, and northeas ...

sayaca''. It has been found on thirteen hosts, from the genera ''

Vochysiaceae Vochysiaceae is a plant family belonging to the order of Myrtales. Description Trees or shrubs with opposite leaves; flowers are zygomorph 1-(3)-5 merous; ovary inferior or superior; one fertile stamen; fruits samara or capsules. Biogeograp ...

'' and ''

Melastomaceae Melastomataceae is a family of dicots, dicotyledonous flowering plants found mostly in the tropics (two-thirds of the genera are from the New World tropics) comprising c. 175 genera and c. 5115 known species. Melastomes are annual or perennial h ...

''.

Description

Taxonomy

Distribution

Ecology

References

Further reading