[Aroid-l] Intra-what!--Structures on Mecon. Philo.'s rhizome

From: ju-bo at msn.com (ju-bo at msn.com) on 2008.07.20 at 12:54:27(18199) ________________________________ > Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2008 15:29:34 +0000 > From: bonaventure at optonline.net > To: aroid-l at gizmoworks.com > Subject: Re: [Aroid-l] Intra-what--Structures on Mecon. Philo.'s rhizome Dear Bonaventure and Friends, Yes, Leyland`s description of the ''dragon`s teeth'' stipules/squamules on his P. mello-barettoanum`s rhizome is accurate, and they WILL hurt you! I received a bad puncture/cut from the knife-like ones on a large P. bipinnatifidum some years ago, and the long and thin spine-like ones that occur on P. undulatum are also daunting when one has to handle a plant! Off-topic for a moment--the plant family Aristolochia is also dear to my heart, though those pictured on the page given by Bonaventure are not A. ringens. The blooms pictured certainly have quite a ''look'' to them though! The widly splayed blooms of several species, including A. grandiflora on Trinidad have a few unmentionably rude ''local''/common names. As one of my first forays into Botany (when I was under 7 years of age) was when I noticed butterfly larvae on a plant of what I today know to have been A. trilobata planted to be used by our maid as birth control! ( I published on this in a later paper). The larvae were of again what I know today to be Battus polydamus, which became the second species of b/fly my brother and I raised to adults. At around 9 or 10, I ''discovered'' the fly-trap blooms of A. rugosa, and even at that age realized that flies were being trapped for pollination purposes! I have a plant of this species growing at my home, I collected it about 20 years ago back in Trinidad, and it does well on a trellis here, flowering profusly almost all year long. No seed-set, as there must not be pollinators around. It is completely denuded by Battus polydamus larvae several times per year with no long-term bad effects! I also discovered a new species in the late 60`s/early 70`s when I worked in S.W. Trinidad by following an Battus belus female in her quest for a larval food plant and on which she deposited her eggs. It was described a couple years later by Miss Panter at Kew in England as A. boosii in honor of the collector of the type specimens. If anyone would like to continue this off-topic thread, please do so off aroid-l at my e-mail address-- +More >ju-bo at msn.com< Enough for one note! Good Growing, Julius Boos WPB, FLORIDA >> Thanks Julius, > > Yes I'm very afraid now. All the STD's going around and now I've got to be on the lookut for WHAT? It sounds like the urban legend. > > Aroids are so Freudian. Slightly OT but reminds me of the image of Aristolochia ridicula I googled. > > Bonaventure

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