Photos by Marlon Machado.

  A friend of Maria Teresa recently found in the field a species that none of us could identify, but George and Dan suggest it might be this little known species they came across when preparing the Flora Neotropica account.

 Flora Neotropica account (Austin & Staples, unpublished):

 [Operculina flammea (Nees) Meisner in Martius, Fl.  Bras. 7: 212. 1869. 

Ipomoea flammea Nees, Regensb. Flora 301, 329. 1821.
Type. Brazil. Southeastern, without specific locality. Prince Neuwied (n. v.).

Original description: “caule volubili foliisque ternatis hirsutis, foliolis oblongo-lanceolatis integerrimis sessilibus, pedunculis elongatis unifloris, bracteis pedato-quinatis. Ausdauernd. Blum hochfeuerfarb (Algebildet.)” (p. 301); “Convolvuls igneus Schr. ist Ipomoea flammeaum.” (p. 239). 

The sessile 3-foliolate leaves suggest an alliance in some species outside Operculina. Until the type material may be examined, the placement of this taxon is problematical.] 

 George has shared with us type images of Ipomoea flammea/Convolvulus igneus which are attached below, along with images of the live plant recently collected in Brasil.

 The challenges here are simultaneously:
- to confidently identify this plant
- to place the "flammea" species in the most apropriate genus: Ipomoea, Merremia, Operculina
- to sort out the priority and legitimacy of the names used