Justicia cubangensis & Justicia eriniae: Two new species of Water Willow from south-central Angola.

Water Willows, Justicia, are perennial herbs and shrubs found in tropical, sub-tropical, and warm temperate regions of the Americas, Africa and India. They typically have heavily veined leaves and white, cream, yellow, orange, or pink tubular flowers, which are attractive to Butterflies, making them widely cultivated as ornamental flowers, though they are not hardy and need to be kept under glass in areas prone to frosts. The genus Justicia is the largest in the family Acanthaceae, and was recently expanded to include the genus Monechma, after that genus was found to contain plants which were morphologically similar to one-another but not genetically monophyletic (i.e. not all sharing a common ancestor which isn't also the ancestor of other plants which are not placed within the genus), and it is likely that other genera will also be subsumed by Justicia in the future.

In a paper published in the journal Blumea on 3 May 2019, Iain Darbyshire of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, and David Goyder of the National Geographic Okavango Wilderness Project at the Wild Bird Trust, describe two new species of Justica from southern Angola.

The first new species is named Justicia cubangensis, meaning 'from Cubanga' in reference to the Cubango River drainage, where it was discovered, part of the upper catchment of the Okavango system in Angola. This plant forms erect or trailing perennial herbs, 15-65 cm high, with annual branching stems arising from a woody base. The stems are quadrangular and hairy, the leaves lance shaped and up to 46 mm in length. Flowers are born on a spike 25-70 mm long and are 12–13 mm long and cream-white in colour, with the palate of the lower lip pink with white veins in raised ‘herring-bone’ pattern. The species was found in Cuando Cubango and Huíla provinces, growing in open grasslands within areas of Miombo (flood-plain) woodland. It was observed at only three locations, and was not abundant at any of these, but may be more widespread as Angola has been under-explored by botanists to date.

Justicia cubangensis. David Goyder in Darbyshire & Goyder (2019).

The second new species described is named Justicia eriniae, in honour of Erin Tripp of the Museum of Natural History at the University of Colorado, who collected the first specimen of this species. This is a brittle-stemmed herb reaching 50-75 cm in height, which has blade-shaped leaves up to 65 mm in length. and produces tubular flowers 18-18.5 mm in length on a flower spike 5.5-8.0 cm high. A single patch of these plants, less than 10 in number, was found growing by a road in Namibe Province, southwest Angola, in an area of lowland thornscrub, though it is unclear if this means the species is rare, since the area is poorly explored.

Justicia eriniae. David Goyder in Darbyshire & Goyder (2019).

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Aristonectine Elasmosaur remains from the Late Cretaceous of Angola.

The Aristonectines were a group of poorly understood Elasmosaurs (long-necked Plesiosaurs) known from the Late Jurassic of the Northern Hemisphere and Late Cretaceous of the Southern Hemisphere. Two species have been described from the Late Jurassic of England and Wyoming, and a further two species from the Late Cretaceous South America, Antarctica and New Zealand, and a number of un-named partial specimens are also known. They had wide snouts with a large number of small teeth, and necks with a large number of short, wide vertebrae, but their ecology and lifestyle is not known.

In a paper published in the Netherlands Journal of Geosciences on 18 February 2015, Ricardo Aráujo of the Museu da Lourinhã and the Huffington Department of Earth Sciences at Southern Methodist University, Michael Polcyn, also of the Huffington Department of Earth Sciences at Southern Methodist University, Johan Lindgren of the Department of Geology at Lund University, Louis Jacobs, again of the Huffington Department of Earth Sciences at Southern Methodist University, Anne Schulp of the Naturalis Biodiversity Center, Octávio Mateus of the Museu da Lourinhã and GeoBioTec at the Universidade Nova de Lisboa and António Olímpio Gonçalves and Maria Morais of the Departamento de Geologia at the Universidade Agostinho Neto describe a series of Aristonectine Elasmosaur remains from the Late Cretaceous Mocuio Formation of Bentiaba in Namibe Province, Angola.

The remains comprise four specimens, the first comprising a series of thirteen cervical and dorsal vertebrae with dorsal and pectoral ribs and a partial femur, the second comprising one ischium, one femur, six autopodial elements and two sacral ribs, the third comprising two autopodial elements, one phalanx, two partial coracoids, partial propodial, two neural arches and five cervical and one pectoral centra, and the fourth comprising two coracoids, two humeri, two vertebral centra and some rib fragments.

The first Aristonectine Elasmosaur from Bentiaba. Aráujo et al. (2015).

The specimens are too fragmentary to be formerly described as a new species, however comparison of these remains to other Aristonectine specimens suggests they cannot be differentiated from other fragmentary remains from Chile and New Zealand, possibly indicating that these may all represent specimens of a single, widespread species.

See also…

Resurrecting the Unfortunate Dragon.

In the early 1860s a 5 m Plesiosaur was excavated from the Early Jurassic Blue Lias Formation at Street-on-the-Fosse in Somerset. This was subsequently...

 A Leptocleidid Plesiosaur from the Early Cretaceous of the Isle of Wight.

The Plesiosaurs were Mesozoic marine reptiles that arose in the Late Triassic or Early Jurassic and persisted till the Late Cretaceous. They were related to modern lizards and snakes, but were fully aquatic, the largest species reaching 15 m in length. All species seem to have been strict carnivores, and at least...

A Plesiosaur from the Early Jurassic of Portugal.

Plesiosaurs were large, fully marine reptiles from the Jurassic and Cretaceous, with both fore- and hind-limbs modified into large flippers. They evolved from the...

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