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Araceae
Schismatoglottis tecturata (Schott) Engl.
SUMMARY
Herb to c. 30 cm tall, solitary to forming small clumps. Stem condensed, epigeal, pleionanthic, c. 5 mm-1 cm diam., to c. 10 cm long (usually much less). Foliage leaves several to many together, subtended by papery linear dark brown (when dry) cataphylls to 5 cm long; petiole 11-24 cm long, slender, sheathing only at very base; sheath very shortly and truncately ligular or not; leaf blade often pendent, usually about equalling the petiole but sometimes longer or shorter, lanceolate to oblong-ovate, dark green adaxially, sometimes whitish about the midrib (very rarely with whitish spots throughout the blade) or concolorous, abaxially paler, somewhat coriaceous, the base cuneate, rarely rounded (never cordate), the tip more or less markedly acuminate, 8-22(-25) cm long × 1-8(-9.5) cm wide; venation more or less obscure adaxially; midrib usually drying with a more or less conspicuous narrow central channel adaxially, abaxially prominent; primary lateral veins slender, 6-9 on each side of midrib, alternating with lesser interprimaries and diverging at c. 45°; secondary venation fine and dense, the tertiary venation forming a fine faint reticulum. Inflorescences (solitary to) clustered in groups of up to eight; peduncle slender, much shorter than the petiole c. 3-6 cm long. Spathe green except greenish ivory spathe limb margins, sometimes irregularly flushed purplish; lower spathe very narrowly ovoid, becoming ovoid, c. 1 cm long; limb slender, more or less clasping the spadix, more or less straight to distinctly incurved ventrally, c. 2.5 cm long, apically mucronate for c. 2 mm, persistent except the marcescent margins, eventually deciduous in fruit. Spadix sessile, slender, subcylindric, c. 2 mm diam. (dry) throughout, somewhat ventrally curved, slightly shorter than the spathe, c. 3 cm long; female zone c. 5 mm long, almost entirely free from the spathe; pistils crowded; ovary squat, drying irregularly rhomboid, c. 0.7 mm diam.; style distinct, c. 0.5 mm long; stigma minutely papillate, hardly wider than the style; interpistillar staminodes absent except for a single basal ring of truncate staminodes c. 1 mm diam.; male and female zones contiguous or separated by one or two whorls of sterile stamens or a short naked zone; male zone c. 1.4 cm long, cylindric, more or less isodiametric with top of female zone; stamens c. 0.6 mm across, with the thecae truncate and much exceeding the connective, opening through conspicuous apical slits; appendix cylindric to tapering, 1/4-? the length of the spadix, basally isodiametric with to slightly wider than the top of the male zone, blunt-tipped, composed of columnar trapezoid to triangular staminodes. Fruiting spathe to c. 5 cm long, with the lower part broadly ovoid, the slender limb finally disintegrating.