Cryptocoryne sp. 'Lingga Island'

I had the good fortune to be given a few specimens of blooming cryptocorynes collected from Lingga Island. Below are the photographs of 2 of them with spathes of differing apperance.

The first had yellow limb with irregular protuberances and reddish throat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The second specimen looked like miniature C. schulzei spathe with dark purple tube.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whether these are considered as new species or a variaiton of existing species, we will leave it to the experts and you to decide on your own.

A short day trip around Kota Tinggi

I recently went for a 1/2 day trip with my explorer friend back to Kota Tinggi area to visit 2 cryptocoryne habitat. To beat the causeway jam, we set off at 0530hrs.

As usual, we started the day with some roti prata after crossing the custom.

 

 

The first habitat we visited was that of C. sp. 'Sedeli 6' which suffered massive destruction a year ago when the plantation owners nearby dug up the river to increase the water flow from the nearby oil palm plantations. After a year of peace, the cryptocorynes were still trying to re-establish themselves. Well at least they were not totally wiped out.

 

 

 

 

 Next location was the habitat of C. schulzei 'Panti'. I was lucky to spot a blooming spathe.

 

After this we spent the rest of the morning walking around the waterfall area and had some mud therapy for our tired feet.

 

 

This is nature's highway for the ants:

Some wild ginger flowers and fungus:

 

 

 

Specimens of some fishes and shrimps found around the waterfall area:

 

 

 

 

One of them ended up in in the claypot as curry fish head for lunch together with wild boar meat, sweet potato leaves and homemade bean curd:



 

 

 

That's the end of the short day trip...

C. sp. 'Central Sumatra 2'

I had the good fortune to obtain from my explorer friend a specimen of C. sp. 'Central Sumatra 2' which flowered inside the collection bag. The blooming spathe at it's original habitat looked like this (click here to see it). The one which bloomed in the bag looked like this:

The leaves looked like this:

The tube and kettle look like this and the front of the throat is slightly open as can be seen in some other species:

The close up of the limbs looked like this:

As can be seen, the limb and the throat formed a sharp angled fold:

As usual, I cut open the kettle to reveal the male and female parts of the flowers and found a caterpiller inside (how did the butterfly laid its eggs inside the kettle?):

Is this comparable to C. zukalii which was found in West Malaysia according to the crypt pages or is this something else?