When time and funding permit, each flower (each plant species) will have its own page, and its own PDF, and eventually its own PPT so that professors and students have plenty of material on Guatemala (and Honduras, etc) to study.
Heliconia adflexa, Coban, Guatemala, Hotel Monja Blanca, FLAAR, by Nicholas Hellmuth
This space is for flowers we have recently found and photographed.
Lacmellea standleyi (Apocynaceae) is commonly called as palo de vaca, lechemiel, milk tree, prickly vaca or vaca tree. It can grow between 5-12 meters high; has logs usually with stringers; twigs flattened when young, cylindrical with age, glabrous. Leaves with petioles 6-10 mm, glabrous or glabrescent. Inflorescences with 4-10 flowers, glabrous or glabrescent. Flowers with calyx lobes 1.5-2 × 2.5-3 mm, rounded, glabrous, sometimes diminutively ciliate; corolla white to creamy-white. The fruit is a green berry rounded (2-2.5 cm of diameter), when mature it turns into a dark yellow color with soft pulp of sweet flavor (Missouri Botanical Garden & Tropical Plants Database).
Uses
The fruits are edible and a latex is obtained from incisions in the stems which is drinkable. In addition, the research “Bioprospecting of Lacmellea standleyi fruits (lechemiel)” (listed in this bibliography) confirm that the fruit has antioxidant capacity and a high nutrient content, suggesting a promising future in the pharmaceutical industry.
Lacmellea standleyi, leche miel, photographed in Tapon Creek, Livingston with an iPhone 12 Pro.
PDF, Articles, Books on Lacmellea standleyi
BALICK, Michael J. and Rosita ARVIGO
2015
Messages from the Gods: A Guide to the Useful Plants of Belize. Oxford University Press, 504 pages.
Plan Maestro de la Reserva Protectora de Manantiales Cerro San Gil, 2008-2012 Consejo Nacional de Áreas Protegidas - CONAP Fundación para el Ecodesarrollo y la Conservación -FUNDAECO The Nature Conservancy – TNC.
Tittle 21: Food and drug administration. Chapter 1: Department of health and human services. Subchapter B: Food for human consumption. Code of Federal Regulations. Title 21, Vol. 3
Provisional Annotated Checklist of the Flora of the Shipstern Nature Reserve. Occasional Papers Of The Belize Natural History Society, Volume 2, Nos. 1-11, pp. 8-36.
Estudios en las Apocynaceae neotropicales XXXIX: revisión de las Apocynoideae y Rauvolfioideae de Honduras. Anales del Jardín Botánico de Madrid, vol. 66, núm. 2, pp. 217-262 Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas Madrid, España.
Includes Lacmellea genus and L. standleyi information
SOTO-Chavarro, Erika Lorena, CHICUÉ, Adriana María, MURILLO-Perea and John
Jairo MÉNDEZ-Artega
2013
Bioprospecting of Lacmellea standleyi fruits (lechemiel). Rev Cubana Plant Med vol.18 no.3 Ciudad de la Habana jul.-set.
the results show that green fruits are suppliers of antioxidant compounds. Higher levels of nutrients are found in the intermediate state and mature fruit has attractive organoleptic properties and a relatively high nutrient content.
Potencial antioxidante, valor nutricional y actividad biológica de los frutos de Lechemiel (Lacmellea standleyi Woodson) en tres estadios de maduración. Universidad de Tolima, Facultad de Ciencias.
Full-text not available.
STANDLEY, Paul C.
1924
Trees and Shrubs of Mexico, Contributions from the United States National Herbarium, Volume 23, Part 4, pp. 849-1312.
Free download.
STANDLEY, Paul C. and Samuel J. RECORD
1936
The Forests and Flora of British Honduras. Field Museum of Natural History. Publication 350, Botanical Series Volume XII. 432 pages plus photographs.
STANDLEY, Paul C. and Louis O. WILLIAMS
1969
Flora of Guatemala. Fieldiana: Botany, Volume 24, Part VIII, Number 4. Chicago Natural History Museum. Pages 263-474.
Free download.
THOMPSON, Kim. M.
2013
Biodiversity in Forests of the Ancient Maya Lowlands and Genetic Variation in a Dominant Tree, Manilkara zapota (Sapotaceae): Ecological and Anthropogenic Implications. PhD dissertation, Biological sciences, University of Cinncinnati.
WILDTRACKS
2005
Payne’s Creek National Park Biodiversity Assessment. Draft Final Report. Wildtracks. Belize. 85 pages.
Foods for Early Man. Ceiba. Revista CEIBA; Vol. 24 N. 1-2
36 pages.
Lacmellea standleyi (Woodson) Monachino, l. c. 285.
Palo de vaca, vaca tree, prickly vaca.
Known only from Guatemala and Belize where the abundant latex is said to be drunk. The fruit, with the odor of mango, may be eaten. (Williams 1981: 31).
This 1981 article is a summary of his previous decades writing botanical descriptions co-authored with Paul C. Standley. So the text is identical but all edible plants are in one single 36-page report.