About Passiflora bogotensis Benth.
Passiflora bogotensis Benth. is a climbing plant that typically forms dense crawling mats, and is covered in more or less dense, often rust-colored hairs. Its stem is robust, angular, and covered in dense short hairs, with very long, thick, hairy tendrils. Its leaves have divided stipules that are 4 to 5 mm long and deciduous; the leaf petiole is 0.6 to 1.5 cm long, thin, covered in dense short hairs, and lacks glands. The overall shape of the leaf blade varies greatly even on a single specimen, most often oblong, occasionally oval or triangular-ovate; it measures 4 to 15 cm long and 3 to 10 cm wide. The blade is shortly 2-lobed, with a truncated interlobular sinus, sometimes with a third small lobe at the center, and even on some specimens the apex is only nearly flat and wavy; the lobes are short, up to 1.5 cm long, obtuse or sub-rounded, with a small sharp point at the tip. The leaf base is rounded or sunken, the margins are entire or slightly wavy. The leaf has 3 palmate veins that are very prominent on the underside; it is pubescent or almost glabrous and shiny on the upper surface, densely covered with coarse shaggy hairs on the underside, and is subcoriaceous. Peduncles are solitary or more commonly paired, up to 4 cm long, and hairy; they bear three bracts 3 to 10 mm long, violet in color, positioned near the apex of the peduncle or somewhat scattered along it. The flowers are up to 4 cm in diameter: the receptacle is short, purple on the outside; sepals are oblong-lanceolate, 1 to 1.5 cm long and about 5 mm wide at the base, obtuse at the apex, more or less hairy and green-purple externally, white inside; petals are oblong, 6 to 9 millimeters long, obtuse, and white. The corona is arranged in two series: the outer series has filaments 4 to 5 mm long, narrowly strap-shaped, somewhat angular, widened at the apex into a flattened knob shape, greenish-yellow with faint purple cross-banding; the inner series has thread-like filaments 2 to 3 mm long, pale green in color. The operculum is collar-shaped, greenish, with a margin divided into small teeth; the ring is obsolete; the ovary is globose, densely covered with long white hairs; the styles are very elongated. The fruit is globose, 1 to 1.5 cm in diameter, purple-blackish when mature; the seeds are ovate or cuneate-obovate, about 3 mm long, with transverse cross markings. Passiflora bogotensis is native to the Eastern Cordillera of Colombia, growing at altitudes between 2,000 and 3,000 meters above sea level. It has also occasionally been found in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. It blooms year-round.
