A new species of Pancratium Dill. ex L. (Amaryllidaceae) from Eastern Ghats of India

Pancratium venkaiahii is described as a new species from Eastern Ghats of India. It is closely allied to P. st-mariae. A comprehensive description with photo substantiation and comparison table are provided.

ISSN 0974-7907 (Online); ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) The genus Pancratium having unique characteristics like perennial herbaceous bulbous, linear lanceolate leaves, umbellate Inflorescence, large flowers with funnel shaped perianth, six stamens attached on the throat of the perianth with filiform filaments united below by a coronal membrane into a toothed or lobed cup, oblong or linear dorsifixed anthers, tricarpellary, syncarpous and trilocular, inferior ovary with 2-seriatein numerous ovules and filiform style.
During our botanical explorations in the Eastern Ghats of Andhra Pradesh, first author was collected an interesting species of Pancratium from hills of Vizianagaram District (Figure 1). It is resembles P. stmariae. After critical taxonomic assessment it was identified as a new species and herbarium specimen was deposited in Herbarium, Department of Botany, Andhra University (Image 2). Some of the bulbs were introduced into the College Campus Garden. A detailed description, comparison table (Table 1), and photographs were provided in this article (Image 1).

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membranous spathe, apex acuminate; flowers without fragrance, with very short perianth tube (1.3cm long), perianth lobes long, filament, greenish white anthers pollen oval shape and long style.
Conservation status: Rare in the study area, quantification of the natural populations of this species is not known but this species is facing threats from grazing and anthropogenic activities. First author introduced this species into the College Campus Garden and observed that all individuals were acclimatized and flowered but there was no fruit set . It was observed that the leaves of this plant was fed by caterpillars in the campus and this species is host for some lily moths.
Ethnomedicine: Generally, bulbs are used as medicine for veterinary diseases and is called 'adavivulli'. Ethno medicinal information for human beings is still not known.
India has more than 50% native Pancratium species including current report, and detailed studies need to www.threatenedtaxa.org The Journal of Threatened Taxa (JoTT) is dedicated to building evidence for conservation globally by publishing peer-reviewed articles online every month at a reasonably rapid rate at www.threatenedtaxa.org. All articles published in JoTT are registered under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License unless otherwise mentioned. JoTT allows allows unrestricted use, reproduction, and distribution of articles in any medium by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of publication.