| Field notes | Acaulescent or short-trunked with persistent leafbases to the ground. No. of leaves 5-10, erect and bending distally; leafbases of young leaves encircling stem, splitting up later in fibrous mesh; petiole app. 150 cm lon, 3.8 cm in largest diam.; abaxialy side flattened; adaxialy side roundded, green with brown scales; rachis 485 cm long, twisted 45°-90° subdistally so that the pinnae are held at a vertical position; abaxially flattened; adaxial side with lepidote tomentum except laterally in spaces between pinnae; pinnae 2 x 99 (+1), inserted regularly, subalternate basally to opposite apically; basal pinnae: 56 x 0.6 cm, central pinnae: 104 x 7.5 cm, apical pinnae: 28 x 1.8 cm. Infructescence: prophyll hardly visible; sheathing floral bract bicarinate, app. 30 cm long, splitting adaxially and abaxially, widest diam. of tubular part 10.5 cm, outside dark brown and lepidote, inside shiny brown; peduncle app. 20 cm long, oval in cross section; longest diam. 5 cm. Fruits clustered in a head-like infructescence, app. 25 cm in diam. on this individual but observed to 35 cm in diam. Style remnants app. 19 cm long with 7 stigmas; remnants of tepals 8 cm long and jutting out between the fruits. Seed endlosperm liquid: Steminate inflorescence: taken from caulescent individual nearby with trunk app. 1.5 m tall. Prophyll barely visible; sheathing floral bract bicarinate, the visible part being app. 115 cm long, pendent, yellow basally to green apically, covered with brown scales, increasingly so towards the apex, splitting adaxially, largest circumscription of tubular part 30 cm; visible part of peduncle app. 80 cm long the cross section oval and 4 x 2.5 cm; sterile bracts 3, the largest one 16 x 3.5 cm; rachis 170 cm long and whitish felted, with 223 groups spirally arranged flowerclusters, the lowermost ones subtended by minute bracts; pedicels to 3 cm long connate basally; flowers in groups of 3 basally on rachis, the central ones in groups of 4, apical flowers solitary; each male flower with ca. 500 stamens. Dupl: QCA(4), MECN(3). |
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