| Field notes | Plants dioecious. Trunks solitary, erect, covered with persistent leaf-sheaths, sometimes with short, c. 30 cm clean stem below, 2 m tall, 35 cm diam excluding leaf-sheaths, 50 cm diam including leaf-sheaths, no roots visible at base. Leaves reduplicately imparipinnate, 8-15, erect, spirally inserted very close together on stem; leaf sheath probably not encircling stem (?); petiole 60 cm long, 15 cm wide at broadest visible part, 6.5 cm wide at apex, not fibrous at margin; rachis 4.1 m long, with 131 pinnae per side, grouped into 2-7 groups, basal pinnae of each group horizontal, others pointing down (abaxially), basal pinnae 45 cm long, 1.8 cm wide, middle pinnae 70 cm long, 5.5 cm wide. Inflorescences interfoliar, solitary in leaf axil, dimorphic. Staminate inflorescences 4 per plant; prophyll erect and included in leaf axil, 45 cm long (estimate), 14 cm wide, green, acuminate tip, bicarinate, splitting at apex but then not fibrous, opening along margins, longitudinally irregularly fissured, reddish brown on inside, glabrous; peduncular bract 55 cm long, 8 cm wide at base, 8.5 cm at widest point, semi-erect at anthesis, acute lanceolate in cross-section with blunt angles at base, oval at middle, bicarinate at apex, red brown outside, except for apical green-yellow 10 cm, reddish brown inside and glabrous; peduncle c. 40 cm long, cream-coloured, lanceolate with blunt margins, and 5 additional not-closing bracts 8 x 5 cm acute, to 4 x 3 cm triangular; rachis 98 cm long, oval in cross-section, without tomentum, glabrous, light pinkish in colour, with 320 flower stalks spirally arranged; stalks ridged, with small membranaceous bract at base; stalks branched to give 4 male flowers; stalks 3 cm long, fused for 1.5 cm and here 7 mm wide at base, 5 mm at apex, free pedicels 2 mm wide, heads densely covered with stamens; filament hyaline, 5 mm long, anthers linear, 7 mm long, apically mucronate, whole head 3.5 cm wide. Duplicates: AAU, NY, QCA. |
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