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  [aroid-l] Silver leaf Philo (hastatum?) blooming - pics
From: "Eugene Hoh" hohe at symphony.net.au> on 2002.11.29 at 10:44:31(9665)
Hello all,
(& sorry to those not Philodendron-inclined, for turning this topic into a
saga...)

Thank you, Eduardo (& Tom) for the helpful info re. P. hastatum.
I've now had a good look at the blooming Philo 'Silver Sword' and it is overall
a close match to your description; I have some pics of it (address below).
However, there seem to be a couple of differences in the flowering parts:
'Silver Sword' has 11-13 locules per ovary, rather than 5-6; and the biggest
plants sometimes have 2 inflorescences per leaf/sympodium. Do you think the
greater no. of locules falls within the variation you would expect for P.
hastatum, or might that indicate that it's perhaps a different species?

Here are few other characteristics of 'Silver Sword':
* petioles of juvenile (pre-sympodial) plants are sheathed along their entire
length; the wings of the sheath usually project several millimetres beyond the
leaf base.
* Adult foliage still quite silvery, though not as much as juveniles
* Stamens cream coloured, in groups of 3 or (most often) 4.
* Staminodial/staminate portion of spadix secretes drops of sticky
reddish-caramel coloured fluid during shedding of pollen
* Spathe is apple-green outside, and is paler in the 'blade' part, fading to
greenish-cream toward the apex. Spathe inside is greenish-off-white; the tube
has translucent vertical "veins" visible toward the base, and also short,
light brown squiggly lines on the surface
* The peduncle is usually slightly shorter than the spathe, and a bit flattened
(cf. petioles)
* I vaguely remember the fruits being beige or straw-coloured.

If anyone's interested, some snapshots of this flowering Philo reside at:
http://au.photos.yahoo.com/consternation3000 - click on 'vegetal' to open the
album/ folder containing the pix.

Anyway, for those still interested, over the next couple of weeks I'll post
some more notes and snapshots of recently flowering Philos, including a couple
of sp. related to 'Silver Sword' which have been successfully cross-pollinated
with it and have yielded seedlings.

Cheers,
Eugene

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