Anchomanes Schott
SUMMARY
HABIT : herbs, often very robust, tuber small to gigantic, erect or grossly rhizomatous, seasonally dormant. LEAF : solitary, often gigantic. PETIOLE : very long, terete, aculeate, rarely smooth, sheath very short. BLADE : sagittate when juvenile, becoming trisect at maturity, primary divisions each further divided ± dichotomously or pinnately, secondary divisions irregularly pinnatifid, ultimate lobes very variable in size and shape, distal ones larger, trapezoid, apically broader, truncate or shallowly bifid, decurrent to sessile, proximal lobes ovate and acuminate; primary lateral veins of ultimate lobes pinnate, long-arcuate, mostly running into margin, sometimes forming irregular submarginal collective vein, higher order venation reticulate. INFLORESCENCE : solitary, usually appearing before leaf. PEDUNCLE : aculeate, rarely smooth, shorter than petiole. SPATHE : erect, broadly ovate to narrowly oblong-lanceolate or oblong-elliptic, boat-shaped, not constricted, convolute basally or not at all, apex sometimes fornicate, marcescent. SPADIX : much shorter or subequal to spathe, cylindric, female zone subequal to male zone or much shorter, male zone contiguous with female, fertile to apex. FLOWERS : unisexual, perigone absent. MALE FLOWER : anthers sessile, compressed, connective slender below, thickened and dilated apically, thecae ovate-oblong, opposite, dehiscing by apical slit. POLLEN : extruded in strands, inaperturate, ellipsoid to ellipsoid-oblong, large (mean 64 µm., range 37-94 µm.), exine psilate or obscurely verruculate, very thin. FEMALE FLOWER : ovary 1-locular, ovule 1, erect, anatropous, funicle very short, placenta basal, style shortly conic or absent, sometimes strongly deflexed towards spadix base, stigma either 2-lobed and reniform to V-shaped or discoid or depressed-globose. BERRY : large, oblong-ellipsoid, fleshy, borne in cylindric spike, red, purplish or partly white. SEED : obovoid to oblong-ovoid, testa very thin, smooth, transparent, embryo large, green, endosperm absent.