Buch.-Ham. ex D. Don
Description
Piper suipigua (Buch.-Ham. ex D. Don) is a climbing pepper of the family Piperaceae distributed across the eastern and central Himalaya and adjacent regions, occurring in India, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Thailand and southern China. The roughly 200 GBIF records indicate a relatively narrow but well-defined sub-Himalayan range. It is a plant of warm-temperate to subtropical forest, growing as a root-climber on tree trunks and over rocks, and is frequently encountered in the disturbed margins of cultivation and around dwellings, as reflected in the Bhutanese record from Trithangebe near a farmhouse at 800 m in May. It typically occurs from the foothills to about 1,500 m.
The plant is a woody to herbaceous climber attaching by adventitious clasping roots at the nodes, with somewhat swollen, jointed stems. The leaves are alternate, ovate to ovate-cordate, entire, acuminate at the apex and palmately several-nerved from near the base, the lower surface frequently glandular-dotted. The minute, perianth-less flowers are densely crowded on slender, pendulous or erect spikes opposed to the leaves, each subtended by a peltate bract; the species is generally dioecious. The fruit is a small, sessile, fleshy drupe aggregated into a fleshy fruiting spike.
Piper is a very large pantropical genus of considerable economic importance, including the source of black pepper (P. nigrum) and betel (P. betle). P. suipigua is one of several Himalayan wild peppers whose aromatic leaves and fruits are used locally as a condiment, masticatory and in folk medicine. The genus is characterised by its sympodial growth, swollen nodes and minute flowers densely packed on opposed spikes. Locally common in suitable habitat, the species is not regarded as being of conservation concern.
Author: Buch.-Ham. ex D. Don · Sources: POWO (Kew), Flora of Bhutan Vol. 1, GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 4, Gardner: Pipers of Nepal and the Himalaya