Berry color of Colocasia esculenta

From: "Dr. Tom Croat" tcroat at LEHMANN.MOBOT.ORG> on 2000.01.03 at 22:43:43(3992) Aroiders: I prepared a description of Colocasia esculenta for the Flora of Veracruz treatment of the Araceae but no collection that I saw, nor any literature that I could find had any mention of berry color. I rarely see it in flower and it may never get pollinated in these escaped from cultivation areas where I have seen it. So if anyone has seen it with berries I would appreciate knowing the berry color. Also if anyone sees anything wrong with the description in other regards I would appreciate hearing back from you. Another point which I would like to clear up is the number of inflorescences that it bears per axil. I have one observation that I made where there was only one inflorescence per leaf axil but I am sure that it probably produces more. Tom Croat +More Colocasia esculenta (L.) Schott, in Schott & Endlicher, Melet. Bot. 18. 1832. Arum esculentum L., Sp. Pl. 965. 1753. Large perennial herb 1-2.5 m tall; stem a cormose or rarely rhizomatous subglobular to oblongoid caudex, mostly 15-18 cm diam, with close leaf scars around its circumference and with smaller secondary subglobular cormules in the lower part of stem; roots arising from the lower portion of stem; leaves arising in whorls from apex of stem; petioles (0.7)1-2.1 m long, glaucescent, sheathed 1/3 to about midway, the free part subterete, obtusely flattened adaxially; blades conspicuously peltate, ovate-cordate to ovate-sagittate, 25-85 cm long, 20-60 cm wide, acuminate at apex; posterior lobes fused to about midway, the lobes rounded; major veins concolorous; midrib flat above, thickly convex and paler below; primary lateral veins 3-6(8) pair, arising at 50-70 angle; basal veins 5-8 pair, the 1st pair free to the base, the remainder variously coalesced into a prominent more or less straight posterior rib which extends to near the end of the posterior lobes; surfaces matte & glabrous, upper surface medium green, sometimes weakly subvelvety, lower surface moderately paler, glaucescent. Inflorescences with peduncle 15-30 cm long; spathe 20-40 cm long, the tube 3-5 cm long, green on both surfaces; blades 15-30 cm long, pale sulfur-yellow to orange-yellow outside, slightly paler inside, oblong-lanceolate, arching away from the spadix or reflexed, twisted apically; spadix 6-14 cm long; pistils greenish, ovules unilocular with a single sessile stigma; ovules 37-67 per locule on 2 to 4 parietal placentas with sterile pistillate flowers scattered among the fertile pistils, these lacking stigma and style; staminate spadix cream-yellow, sterile staminate section of spadix markedly constricted, 2-5 cm long; fertile staminate portion about as thick as the pistillate portion, staminodia with 2-6 linear anthers, thecae dehiscent by terminal pores; terminal sterile appendage creamy white, many times longer than the fertile portion of spadix. Berries color?; seeds 1.0-1.5 mm long, 0.7-1.0 mm diam, ovate, pale yellow, longitudinaly ridged, bearing a conspicuous hilum at one end and a delicate, translucent funiculus; chromosome number 2n(. Native to some unknown area of Asia but now widely cultivated in tropics and subtropics of both hemispheres.

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