ABSTRACT:

The Hamburg Botanical Garden is one of the largest (24 hectares) and most valuable gardens in Germany and houses special collections in its non-public greenhouses. Among these is the Amorphophallus collection which is in large part based on the former research collection of W. L. A. Hetterscheid and has been introduced and expanded by myself in Hamburg. It comprises nearly 130 species of Amorphophallus and related genera represented by some 1,000 accessions. Such a living treasure needs care and attention as it is the base for future research and investigation. In parallel, representative material needs subsequently to be transferred into a herbarium collection.