AMORPHOPHALLUS CARNEUS

Species

ORIGINAL DESCRIPTION:

Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society No. 41 (1904) P.47

SYNONYMS:

HOMOTYPIC SYNONYMS: N/A

HETEROTYPIC SYNONYMS: N/A

ACCEPTED INFRASPECIFICS: N/A

OTHER: Amorphophallus carnea

DISTRIBUTION: Thailand, Malaysia

CLIMATE: N/A

ECOLOGY: Found on limestone rocks

SPECIES DESCRIPTION:

Tuber depressed-globose, ca. 4–5 cm in diam., ca. 3 cm high, pale to mid brown, smooth, producing annual, shortly elongate offsets. Leaf solitary; petiole to ca. 40 cm long, ca. 1 cm in diam., smooth, dirty white or greyish green or pinkish white, with reddish brown or very dark brown spots; lamina to ca. 50 cm in diam.; leaflets elliptic-lanceolate, long-acuminate, 6–14 cm long, 2–5 cm in diam., upper surface glossy green, main veins impressed.

INFLORESCENCE:

Inflorescence long-peduncled; peduncle as petiole, ca. 10–30 cm long, ca. 0.5–1.0 cm in diam.; spathe triangular-ovate, 9–13 cm long, 8–10 cm in diam., obtuse or acute, outside pale brownish whitish to the base with a pinkish flush and with blackish brown spots, inside off-white with pale brownish veins, base within with small, punctiform or slightly longitudinally elongate warts. Spadix shortly stipitate (0.5 cm) or sessile, shorter than, equalling or slightly longer than spathe, 8–15.5 cm long.

VARIEGATED FORMS: N/A

PROPAGATION:

Cuttings taken the earliest rooted the best, with percentages dropping from 100% to 39.6% for the latest taken cuttings.

ETYMOLOGY: The species epithet, similar to Amorphophallus carnosus, is derived from the latin carnea/carneus which translates to flesh, likely referring in this case to the flesh-colored spathe of Amorphophallus carneus

NOTES: Amorphophallus carneus resembles Amorphophallus excentricus, the latter differing mainly in having a larger, especially broader appendix with more prominent grooves. The upper side of the leaflets of Amorphophallus excentricus are dull green as opposed to glossy green in Amorphophallus carneus. The distribution and extreme morphological similarity between these two species suggests that they may represent one and the same taxon but more material is necessary to decide upon this.

CULTIVARS: N/A

HYBRIDS: N/A