You are here
Araceae
Amorphophallus ankarana Hett., Ittenbach & Bogner
SUMMARY
Tuber disciform, 10-15 cm in diam. and 5-7 cm high, weighing to ca. 1 kg, pale tan, developing several globose offsets per season, these directly attached to the main tuber. LEAF: Cataphylls ca. 3, pink or whitish pink, with dark pink to ochre-coloured, oval and partly confluent spots, thin, 20-30 cm long, 4-6 cm in diam. Leaf developing alongside the inflorescence; petiole 15-80 cm long and 2-5 cm in diam., smooth or very shallowly ribbed, fleshy, dirty pale greenish or pale brownish with scattered small, oval, reddish brown to brown spots, near the base a reddish brown hue all over; lamina, unfolding after flowering, highly dissected, 30-100 cm in diani., rachises narrowly winged; leaflets coriaceous, ovate-lanceolate to lanceolate, 4-22 cm long, 1.5-7 cm in diam., acuminate to long acuminate, upper surface dull dark green, lower surface bright green. INFLORESCENCE developing with the leaf or slightly earlier, erect. Peduncle 30-75 cm long and 1-2.5 cm in diam., coloured as petiole. Spathe erect, elongate triangular, 16-35 cm long, 10-14 cm in diam., apex acute, base rounded, margins often strongly revolute, limb and base not separated by a constriction, limb slightly or strongly twisted lengthwise, margin strongly undulate, base tubular, ovoid or cylindric, outside glossy dark or pale olive green to olive brown, with scattered, rounded, reddish brown spots and pale brownish veins, inside brownish purple at the base, above white with a faint purplish flush, verrucate, verrucae upwards chained to form long branching ridges, limb outside glossy olive brown or pale olive brown, with scattered, rounded, reddish brown spots and pale brownish veins, inside white, sometimes with a faint purplish flush at the centre, or all purple. Spadix sessile, longer than spathe, 28-40 cm long; female zone slightly obconic, 1-2.5 cm long, 1.1-1.8 cm in diam. at the base, flowers congested or slightly distant; male zone cylindric, 2.5-4 cm long, 1-1.6 cm in diam., flowers slightly distant, in distinct spirals, upwards more distant and gradually merging into a zone with irregular staminodes; appendix (incl. staminodial region) 23-35 cm long, 0.9-1.8 cm in diam., elongate conic, gradually tapering to the (sub)acute apex, brown or purplish brown, with a distinct waxy layer, producing a suffocating spicy odour or one reminiscent of cacao and oozing droplets of a clear fluid, the basal region containing deformed male flowers, showing all stages from normal flowers to papillate staminodes, the latter upwards merging to form broad ridges, leaving deep fissures in between, still higher up the ridges merge and form the outer wall of the appendix. Ovaries ovoid-pyriform or globose, 2-2.5 mm in diam., ca. 2.5 mm high, bright pale green, the apical region sometimes purplish, unilocular (pseudomonomerous); style absent or almost absent (to ca. 0.3 mm long); stigma slightly depressed, ovate or subtriangular in cross-section, shallowly 2- or 3-lobed, 0.5-1.2 mm in diam., 0.5-1 mm high, lobes obtuse, surface yellow, densely papillate. Male flowers consisting of 2-4 stamens; stamens ca. 2 mm long; filaments absent; anther obtuse, ca. 1.5-2 mm long, ca. 1.5-2 mm in diam., orange, connective and base of anthers reddish purple, pores apical, elongate. Pollen inaperturate.exine pistillate, shed on the third day of flowering. INFRUCTESCENCE with spathe remains; fruiting part cylindric, 12 cm long, 2.5 cm in diam.; berries reddish, 0.7-0.9 cm long, 0.5-0.7 cm in diam.;seeds ovoid, 0.5-0.7 cm long, 0.4-0.5 cm in diam. chromosomes; 2n = 26