Rhaphidophora corneri (Araceae)
Small, slender, heterophyllous, leptocaul , liane of unknown ultimate height; seedling stage and pre-adult plant unknown; LEAVES: adult shoot known from flowering portions only, these either very long sympodia or physiognomically monopodial (not clear from specimen), free but producing one or two stout feeding roots from each node (adult plant thus perhaps resembling Scindapsus scortechinii and therefore representing an architectural type hitherto unrecorded in Rhaphidophora); stems smooth, without prophyll, cataphyll and petiolar sheath fibre, internodes to 1-9 x 0.5-0.7 cm, separated by prominent corky leaf scars; flagellate foraging stems not observed (absent?); clasping roots not observed; feeding roots one or two per node, non-adherent (always?), stout, corky; leaves distichous, erect or spreading on adult shoots; cataphylls and prophylls membranous, soon drying and falling; petiole narrowly canaliculate, 6-9 x 0.2-0.3 cm, smooth, apical and basal genicula prominent; petiolar sheath obscure except for basal-most portion, extending (always?) to the apical geniculum, sheath of newest leaf degrading into a very few feeble fibres, sheath soon (?) falling to leave a proportionally wide, corky scar basally on the petiole; lamina entire or with a few, large ovate to rhomboid or trapezoid perforations extending almost to the margin, 11-15 x 6-8 cm, oblong-lanceolate, slightly oblique, sub-coriaceous, base obtuse to weakly cordate, apex acute to acuminate with a slightly prominent apiculate tubule; mid-rib prominently raised abaxially, slightly raised adaxially; primary venation pinnate but distal-most veins becoming weakly reticulate and not reaching leaf margin, raised abaxially, raised, but weakly so, adaxially; interprimaries weakly reticulate to sometimes sub-parallel to primaries, slightly raised abaxially, weakly raised adaxially, often forming a weak reticulum; secondary venation reticulate, slightly raised abaxially, weakly raised adaxially; tertiary venation prominently reticulate; INFLORESCENCE two (more?) together, each subtended by a prominent swiftly falling cataphyll, and arising sequentially on an elongated reiterative floral sympodia at the tip of (probably) plagiotropic free lateral shoots; peduncle terete, 1-1.3 x 0.2-0.25 cm; spathe canoe-shaped, thick, stout-beaked, c.c. 2.7-2.9 x 0.7-0.8 cm; spadix cylindrical, sessile, inserted slightly obliquely on peduncle, c.c. 2 x 0.42 cm; stylar region well developed, rounded-rhombohexagonal, c.c. 3 -3.2 x 1.95-2 mm, convex to truncate, smoothly rounded; stigma impressed irregularly elliptic, longitudinally orientated, c.c. 1 x 0.5 mm; anthers exserted (?) at anthesis; INFRUCTESCENCE not observed.
The manner of inflorescence production in R. corneri is unique in the genus. The inflorescences arise sequentially from an elongated reiterative floral sympodium on the tips of (probably) plagiotropic free lateral shoots with each new inflorescence carried some distance from that preceding. The specimen studied bears the scars of several inflorescences together with two developing inflorescences at different stages of maturity, suggesting that the sympodia reiterate over a long period of time. The only other species to a similar type of inflorescence production (but there on the adherent orthotropic shoots and with the inflorescences congested) are the New Guinea R. ledermannii Engl. & K. Krause and R. versteegii Engl. & K. Krause
Peninsular Malaysia (Terengganu). Endemic.