Tococa
(Tococo is the name of T. guianensis in Guiana). Including Sphaerogyne. ORD. Melastomaceae. A genus comprising about thirty species of glabrous or hispid-pilose, stove shrubs, natives of North Brazil, Venezuela, and Guiana. Flowers white or pink, rather large, paniculate, naked or included in ample bracts; calyx tube terete or costate, the limb dilated, five or six-lobed; petals five or six, obovate or oblong, obtuse or retuse; stamens ten or twelve, equal. Leaves petiolate, ample, membranous, rarely coriaceous, entire or denticulated, five-nerved, often having on the base or on the petiole a two-lobed, inflated bladder. The species known to cultivation are here described. They thrive in a compost of one part sandy loam and two parts rough peat. Cuttings of side shoots should be inserted in February. T. ferruginea (rusty). l. three-ribbed, elliptic-oblong, shortly acuminate, shaded green on the upper surface, paler beneath, the younger ones stained with red. Stem terete, clothed with cinnamon-coloured scurf. South America, 1868. SYN. Sphaerogyne ferruginea.
T. guianensis (Guiana). fl. shortly pedicellate or sessile; calyx limb entire; petals whitish-pink, obovate-cordate, inequilateral; panicle terminal. August and September. l. very variable in size and shape; broadly elliptic or ovate, shortly acuminate, rounded at base, very slightly denticulated; petioles scarcely 1/4in. long beneath the bladder. h. 3ft. to 4ft. Guiana, 1826. T. imperialis (imperial). l. large, elliptic, of a rich dark green, having a silky or velvety surface, and with the principal veins reddish at base. Peru, 1869. A very handsome plant. SYN. Sphaerogyne imperialis. T. latifolia (broad-leaved). fl. very shortly pedicellate; petals of a beautiful pink or red; panicle terminal, more or less contracted, the branches slender. l. long-petiolate, broadly ovate, apiculate, entire or inconspicuously dentate-ciliated below the apex, rounded at base. Stem simple. Equinoctial America, 1862. SYN. Sphaerogyne latifolia.