Ficus maxima

Ficus maxima is a fig tree which is native to Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean and South America south to Paraguay. Figs belong to the family Moraceae. The specific epithet maxima was coined by Scottish botanist Philip Miller in 1768; Miller's name was applied to this species in the Flora of Jamaica, but it was later determined that Miller's description was actually of the species now known as Ficus aurea. To avoid confusion, Cornelis Berg proposed that the name should be conserved for this species. Berg's proposal was accepted in 2005. Individuals may reach heights of 30 m (98 ft). Like all figs it has an obligate mutualism with fig wasps; F. maxima is only pollinated by the fig wasp Tetrapus americanus, and T. americanus only reproduces in its flowers. F. maxima fruit and leaves are important food resources for a variety of birds and mammals. It is used in a number of herbal medicines across its range. Ficus maxima is a tree which ranges from 5–30 m (16–98 ft) tall. Leaves vary in shape from long and narrow to more oval, and range from 6–24 (cm) (2–9 in) long and from 2.5–12 cm (0.98–4.72 in) wide. F. maxima is monoecious; each tree bears functional male and female flowers. The figs are borne singly and are 1–2 cm (0.39–0.79 in) in diameter (sometimes up to 2.5 cm ). With about 750 species, Ficus (Moraceae) is one of the largest angiosperm genera. (Frodin ranked it as the 31st largest.) Ficus maxima is classified in subgenus Pharmacosycea, section Pharmacosycea, subsection Petenenses. Although recent work suggests that subgenus Pharmacosycea is polyphyletic, section Pharmacosycea appears to be monophyletic and is a sister group to the rest of the genus Ficus. In 1768, Scottish botanist Philip Miller described Ficus maxima, citing Linnaeus' Hortus Cliffortianus (1738) and Hans Sloane's Catalogus plantarum quæ in insula Jamaica (1696). Sloane's illustration of this plant (published in his 1725 A voyage to the islands Madera, Barbados, Nieves, S. Christophers and Jamaica) depicted it with figs borne singly, a characteristic of the Ficus subgenus Pharmacosycea. A closer examination of Sloane's description led Cornelis Berg to conclude that the illustration depicted a member of the subgenus Urostigma, almost certainly F. aurea, and that the illustration of singly borne figs was probably artistic license. Berg located the plant collection upon which Sloane's illustration was based and concluded that Miller's F. maxima was, in fact, F. aurea. In 1806 the name Ficus radula was applied to material belonging to this species. The description, based on material collected in Venezuela by German naturalist Alexander von Humboldt and French botanist Aimé Bonpland, was published in Carl Ludwig Willdenow's fourth edition of Linnaeus' Species Plantarum. This is the oldest description that can unequivocally be applied to this species. In 1847 Danish botanist Frederik Michael Liebmann applied the name Pharmacosycea glaucescens to Mexican material belonging to this species. (It was transferred to the genus Ficus by Dutch botanist Friedrich Anton Wilhelm Miquel in 1867.) In 1849 the name Ficus suffocans was applied to Jamaican material belonging to this species in August Grisebach's Flora of the British West Indian Islands. In their 1914 Flora of Jamaica, William Fawcett and Alfred Barton Rendle linked Sloane's illustration to F. suffocans. Gordon DeWolf agreed with their conclusion and used the name F. maxima for that species in the 1960 Flora of Panama, supplanting F. radula and F. glaucescens. Since this use has become widespread, Berg proposed that the name Ficus maxima be conserved in the way DeWolf had used it with a new type (Krukoff's 1934 collection from Amazonas, Brazil). This proposal was accepted by the nomenclatural committee in 2005. Ficus maxima ranges from the northern Caribbean to southern South America, in countries where English, Spanish, Portuguese and a variety of indigenous languages are spoken. Across this range, it is known by a variety of common names.