| Andea | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Andea sericea in Armenia, Colombia | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Magnoliids |
| Order: | Laurales |
| Family: | Lauraceae |
| Genus: | Andea van der Werff |
| Species [1] | |
26; see text | |
Andea is a genus of flowering plants in the family Lauraceae. It includes 26 species of trees and shrubs native to the tropical Americas, including Costa Rica, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Peru. [1] Most species grow in the northern Andes mountains, after which the genus is named, in tropical montane forests above 1000 meters elevation. One species ( A. fulvescens ) is native to the Cordillera de Talamanca of Costa Rica. [2]
Plants in the genus are gynodioecious, with some individual plants bearing female flowers only while others bear bisexual (hermaphrodite) flowers. The species were formerly placed in genus Ocotea , and are distinguished from other gynodioecious Ocotea species by their thick terete twigs (generally 6 mm or more in diameter, and 4–7 mm in diameter in a few species), sessile or nearly sessile leaves without domatia, and large flowers (6 mm or more in diameter) with rotate tepals and (shallowly) bowl-shaped cupules. [2]