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Araceae
Amorphophallus gomboczianus Pic.Serm.
SUMMARY
Tuber disciform, 10-25 x 5-10 cm, dark red to red brown, roots emerging from the upper half of the tuber, not deep under ground, not forming offsets. LEAF 1-1.5 m high, emerging after flowering. Petiole up to 1 m long, up to 4 cm in diameter, black purple to light brown with many dark green and cream spots, longitudinally ribbed. Blade up to 1 m in diameter, rachis of the main segments and end leaflets basally narrowly winged and [rachis] of higher division order leaflets narrowly cuneiformly ('keilförmig') winged; terminal leaflets broadly elliptic ('oval') to inversely egg-shaped, 6-12 x 2-5 cm, ending in a short (0.5-1 cm long) cuneiformly ('keilförmig') tip, underside with reddish and raised veins, margin smooth to crinkly undulate. Cataphylls 2, 6-12 x 2-3 cm and 20-30 x 2-4 cm, membranous; light purple with small, dark purple to brown spots; long and triangularly acute. INFLORESCENCE emerging before the leaf, long stipitate, 50-150 cm high. Peduncle 32-105 cm long, 1-3 cm in diameter, as petiole. Spathe erect, 18-35 cm log; without a constriction, arranged into a basally rolled-up, narrow, ovoid ('oval') to conical tube and a narrow, triangular acute open limb. Tube 4 x 4 cm, regularly ovoid ('oval') to conical; outside mottled pale and dark green to olive brown; inside basally smooth, dark violet, irregularly striped with whitish and beige to pale green or olive to brown towards the open limb. Open limb beige to pale green or olive to brown, turning pale lilac towards the margin, margin not lobed and smooth. Spadix stipitate for 0.5-1 cm, 15-40 cm long, about 1/2 times longer than the spathe. Pistillate zone obconical, 1-2.5 x 1-2 cm, flowers mostly congested, tightly running around the axis in four to six spirals, but looser at the base, tissue compact. Staminate zone obconical, 3-5.5 x 1.5-3.5 cm, widest in the middle, tissue shredded open, flowers congested but not without gaps, here and there gaps of 1 mm in diameter, fertile and a few sterile stamens run up the appendix basally for a few mm. Appendix club-shaped, 15-35 cm long, 3 cm in diameter (basally), gradually tapering from the base and ending in a rounded tip, surface basally with irregular longitudinal furrows, these seem prickly due to small spikes, purple, basally slightly constricted. Staminodes only at the base and only very few, these as spikes to irregularly formed warts. Sterile zone between pistillate and staminate zone absent; ratio of pistillate to staminate zone 0.3 : 1; pistillate flowers 3-4 mm long; ovary dice-shaped to inversely egg-shaped, greenish, 1-2 x 1.5-2 mm, two-(three)locular, 1 basal ovule-attachment per locule, anatropous; style 1-2 mm long, often with a ring-shaped thickening in the upper third, dark purple; stigma somewhat at an angle on the style, globose, 0.5 x 0.5 mm. Stamens small, 0.8 x 1 mm, 3 stamens form one flower; anthers free, rectangular to broadly elliptic ('oval') in transverse section, 0.7 x 1 mm; filaments short, 0-0.2 mm, free; connective channelled; pores apical, per theca two circular or one elongate to broadly elliptic ('oval') pores. Pollen inaperturate, 28.4-43 x 22.8-35 µm, globose to slightly ovoid, exine striate. INFRUCTESCENCE 1-1.5 m long, peduncle 1-1.4 m long and 2-3 cm in diameter. Infructescence stipitate for 0.5-1.5 cm, slightly conical to ovoid ('oval'), 3-8 x 2.5-5 cm, usually with remains of the spathe. Berries two seeded, elongate to ovoid, 1-1.5 x 0.6-1 cm, green when immature, yellow when mature. Seeds angular to triangular or flattened on one side to broadly elliptic ('oval') from above, ribbed (parallel-) net-like, 0.8-1.2 x 0.4-0.5 cm. Smell of rotting meat.