Cyrtosperma beccarianum (Araceae)
Feeble to moderately robust herbs 40-150 cm high. Leaves 3-7; sheath papery, fibrous, about one quarter of the length of the petiole; petiole sparsely armed to unarmed, rarely rather densely spiny; lamina variable, held with the anterior lobe down and the posterior lobes up, usually sagittate; anterior lobe triangular, c. 10 cm long, 8 cm wide at the base; posterior lobes lanceolate, c. 25 cm long, 7.5 cm wide at the midpoint; posterior midribs naked in the angle of the sinus for up to 4 cm, sinus 30-100 degrees; peduncle subequalling to exceeding the petioles, mostly with sparser armature, like the petioles variously blotched and marbled green, brown, pink and white in varying proportions, or plain brown or green, often drying greyish. Spathe broadly to narrowly ovate, opening broadly boat-shaped to flat, white, pale pink, or pale yellow, tip acuminate, 1.8 x 5 to 4.8 x 9 cm; spadix sessile, adnate to the spathe for c. 5 mm, 4 x 20 mm in flower, 1.5 x 6 cm in fruit, pale yellow. Flowers tetramerous; ovule solitary. Fruit orange, globose, protruding from the spadix as it swells. Seeds tightly curved, smooth.
Lamina held with the posterior lobes up, anterior lobe down; spathe ovate to ovate-lanceolate.
Southwest and West New Guinea.
Low altitude in streams and ditches, swamp forest and gallery forest undergrowth, in shade. Ecology and leaf form of most individuals of this species combine to make this an example of a rheophyte.