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Bread and cheese

Paullinia pinnata

Also called Barbasco

Bread and cheese
Photo: Marco Schmidt, CC BY-SA 2.5
Family
Sapindaceae (Soapberry & maple family)
Grows as
Shrub, Climber
Native range
Trop. & Subtrop. America, Trop. & S. Africa, Comoros, Madagascar
Climate
wet tropical

About

Paullinia pinnata is a flowering plant species in the genus of Paullinia found in South America and Africa.

The long flexible stems of P. pinnata are used to poison fish in shallow pools, as described by the English naturalist Henry Walter Bates in his book The Naturalist on the River Amazons.

Safety

The plant contains the ceramide paullinomide A, β-amyrin, steroids, the coumarinolignoid 2-(4-hydroxy-3,5-dimethoxyphenyl)-3-hydroxymethyl-2,3-dihydro-1,4,5-trioxaphenanthren-6-one, 5α-poriferastane-3ß,6α-diol and l-quebrachitol. It also contains the triterpenoids lupeyl steryl ether, 3-oxo-11α-hydroxyl-20(29)lupen and the lupeol-3-isovanniloyl ester paullinoyl (3-O-isovanilloyl-3R,5R,8R,9R,10R,13R,14S,17S,18R,19R-lup-20(29)-en), and the flavone glycosides diosmetin-7-O-(2‘ ‘-O-β-d-apiofuranosyl-6‘ ‘-acetyl-β-d-glucopyranoside) and tricetin-4‘-O-methyl-7-O-(2‘ ‘-O-β-d-apiofuranosyl-6‘ ‘-acetyl-β-d-glucopyranoside).

Where it grows

A number of lepidopteran larvae (Morpho polyphemus, Fresna nyassae, Neptis trigonophora, Brenthia elongata, Charaxes lycurgus, Charaxes zelica, Euphaedra medon, Euphaedra harpalyce, Neptis clarei, Neptis nysiades, Neptis rogersi, Neptis troundi) feed on P. pinnata.

Other Paullinia plants

Guarana · Moldy bread and cheese · Paullinia navicularis · Paullinia paullinioides · Yoco · Bread and cheese

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Paullinia pinnata by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts are shared under the same licence.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

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