C. moehlmannii spathe

I had the great fortune to obtain from my explorer friend a blooming specimen of C. moehlmannii which he had previously collected around Aceh in Sumatra. The specimen was grown in my friend's farm with used charcoal filter media and was infected with red mites (see the swamp of mites on the unopened spathe) which I did not noticed until I was cutting the spathe.

The spathe opened a few days later in my home.

The limb of the spathe was red (can you spot the red mite on the limb?). The collar had a distinctive circular line separating the lower smoother portion from the upper rougher limb. This distinctive line could be seen at the back of the limb too as a bulge.

We cut opened the kettle as usual to reveal the male and female portion of the spathe.

The inner wall of the kettle just below the throat had red spots.

The spadix was wrapped up within the flap / valve.

 A closer look at the spadix, stigma and olfactory bodies.

spathes of bucephalandra vs aridarum vs bakoa

I took some photographs of the spathes of bucephalandra, aridarum and bakoa from my friend's farm for comparison.

Bucephalandra:

The leaves of bucephalandra found at different locations may look different but the spathe do not look very different in my opinion as compared to that of cryptocorynes. Below are some examples.

 

Aridarum:

Bakoa:

The naked spathes:

Time flies, final update on hydroponics results

Time flies. It has been closed to a year since I started to grow some cryptocorynes with just water and sponge media. Of the 16 species tested, only C. ferruginea, C. alba and C. ideii (collected from west Kalimantan which i suspected could had been C. ferruginea too) eventually survived the harsh environment. There shall be no further updates on this in the future as only 2 or 3 species are left.