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SANSEVIERIA CANALICULATA AND S.BACULARIS IN THE SANSEVIERIA CYLINDRICA GROUP

SANSEVIERIA CANALICULATA AND S.BACULARIS IN THE SANSEVIERIA CYLINDRICA
GROUP

Steve Jankalski

The name "Sansevieria bacularis" was attributed to Horst Pfennig by David
Grigsby in his 1983 Wish Book - plant list.  The name is derived from the
Latin, "Baculum", meaning a rod or a staff, in allusion to the cylindrical
leaves.  A search of the literature has revealed that the name has not been
validly published. If anyone can shed some information of the status of
this name, please, let me know.

Thulin (1994) described Sansevieria fischeri as occurring in Somalia.
However, his description sounds more like "S.bacularis" than the former.
(True S.fischeri (Baker) Marais (S.singularis N.E. Brown) occurs in Kenya
and Tanzania.) Thulin also mentions that the Somali species was also
previously misidentified as S.stuckyi and S.robusta. This may be the
missing info to the origin of this mystery plant. More research in both the
field and herbarium is needed to clear up the origin and to validate this
distinctive species.

In the horticultural trade, the plant is often misidentified as Sansevieria
sulcata but that name is clearly a synonym of S.canaliculata. The confusion
probably arose as the species will key out to Sansevieria sulcata in N.E.
Brown (1915) but his diagnosis and specimens referred to that name by Brown
clearly belong to S.canaliculata. Jumelle (1923) demonstrated that
authentic plants of S.sulcata Bojer were indistinguishable from
S.canaliculata Carriere in flower and that the latter name is the correct
one for the species on account of its priority of publication. This view
was adopted by Humbert (1938) and Rauh (1998).

Even though S.canaliculata was said to have originally come from Reunion
(Isle of Bourbon) by N.E. Brown (1915), there is no mention of the species
occurring on the island by Marais (1978). There is proportedly a dwarf form
of Sans. canaliculata. This has been said to be the form from Madagascar
and to have leaves under 8" long. Maintaining the small size appears to
depend on the mode of culture. I have seen plants proportedly of this form
with leaves over a foot in length and plants from Madagascar illustrated by
Rauh (1998) resemble typical Sans. canaliculata.

These two species appear to be closely allied to Sansevieria cylindrica
Bojer and S.erythraeae Mattei (S.schweinfurthii Tackholm & Drar, nom.
illegit.) by having cylindrical leaves with a concolorous green basal
sheath, not a bicolor hyaline white margin with a reddish border.

Sansevieria canaliculata Carriere, Revue Horticole 33: 449 (1861); N.E.
Brown, Kew Bulletin 1915 (5): 44-45, fig. 11 (1915); Humbert, Flore de
Madagascar 40e: 16 (1938); Rauh, Succulent and Xerophytic Plants of
Madagascar 2: 330, figs. 1223-1224 (1998)
syn.  Sansevieria schimperi Baker in T.Dyer, Fl. Trop. Afr. 7: 335 (1898)
_      Sansevieria sulcata Bojer ex Baker, Journ. Linn. Soc., Bot. 14: 549
(1874) nom. nud. (pro syn. under S.cylindrica Bojer), Baker, Kew Bulletin
1887 (5): 10-11, fig. 7 (1887) nom. nud., Bojer ex Baker in T.Dyer, Fl.
Trop. Afr. 7: 335 (1898); Bojer ex N.E. Brown, Kew Bulletin 1915 (5): 43
(1915)
_      Sansevieria cylindrica sensu Jacobsen, Handb. Succ. Pl.  2: 754,
figs. 1006-1007 (1960) not Bojer (1837)
Madagascar, Aldabra, Comoros, Mozambique, Tanzania. Leaves smooth and
green, with prominent longitudinal ridges, apex hard and spinescent.

Sansevieria bacularis Pfennig, nom. prov.
syn. Sansevieria sulcata hort. not Bojer ex Baker (1898)
_     ?Sansevieria stuckyi sensu Chiovenda, Flora Somala 2: 422 (1932);
sensu Cufodontis, Bull. Jard. Bot. Nat. Belg. 41 (3) suppl.: 1572 (1971)
not Godefroy-Lebeuf (1903)
_     ?Sansevieria robusta sensu Chiovenda, Flora Somala 2: 422 (1932) not
N.E. Brown (1915)
_        ?Sansevieria fischeri sensu Thulin, Flora of Somalia 4: 29 (1994)
not Marais (1986)
Somalia (The above misidentifications are based upon Senni 131 (FT),
Calvino s.n. (FT), Guidotti s.n. (FT))
Closely allied to S.canaliculata but differs by having verrucose roughened
leaves, crossbanded and without longitudinal ridges and by having a soft
leaf apex.

It should be noted that the name Sansevieria schweinfurthii is illegitimate
because it was named without a Latin diagnosis or a cited type specimen. In
any case, there is an earlier name, Sansevieria erythraeae Mattei, for the
same species as was pointed out by Teketay (1995).

Sansevieria erythraeae Mattei, Boll. Stud. Inform. Giard. Colon. 4: 170
(1918); Teketay, Sansevieria Journ. 4 (2): 50 (1995)
syn. Sansevieria cylindrica sensu Schweinfurth, Bull. Herb. Boissier,
append. 2: 177 (1894); sensu Fiori, Boschi e Piante Legn. Eritea 105 (1913)
not Bojer (1837)
_     Sansevieria schweinfurthii Tackholm & Drar, Bull. Fac. Sci., Cairo
Univ. 30: 306 (1954) comb. illegit, ICBN art. 36.1
Eritrea,?Ethiopia, ?Sudan. Allied to S.cylindrica Bojer but with leaves
smooth, not cross banded and with a soft apical tip. Also S.erythraeae is
reported to be diploid while S.cylindrica is hexaploid (Menzel & Pate
(1960)).

Sansevieria erythraeae 'Variegated' Chahinian
syn. Sansevieria schweinfurthii 'Variegated' Chahinian, Cact. & Succ.
Journ. Amer. 67 (3): 181, fig. 1 (1995)

Sansevieria cylindrica Bojer, Hort. Maurit. 349 (1837); J.D. Hooker,
Curtis's Bot. Mag. 85: t. 5093 (1859); N.E. Brown, Kew Bulletin 1915 (5):
37-38, fig. 5C (1915)
syn. Sansevieria angolensis Welwitsch ex Hooker, Report on Veget. Prod.
Paris Exhib. 148 (1855)
_     Cordyline cylindrica (Bojer) Britton, Sci. Surv. Porto Rico & Virgin
Islands 5: 150 (1923)
_     Sansevieria guineensis Weiner, Illustr. Gart.-Zeit. 421, fig. 80
(1887) not Willdenow (1799)
Angola. Leaves striate marked, verrucose roughened, apex hard and
spinescent.

Sansevieria cylindrica var. patula N.E. Brown, Kew Bulletin 1915 (5):
38-39, fig. 5D (1915)
Angola
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