Homalomena griffithii

(Schott) Hook. f. 1893

This species is native to Sarawak in Malaysia.

	It must have grown underwater before I bought it in 1999. When I planted it into a pot it couldn't resist the dry air and died. The petioles and the lower side of the leaves were red.

In 2008 I bought 2 new plants in the same shop, also sold as aquatic.	They were brutally cut out of the stem. These two had roots, but other in the shop had none.
They also lost all the leaves and one of the plants died. This is the one that survived.	After almost 4 months in the florarium, the plant produced the first small leaf.
Two months later it looked so.
The plant a in 2009, a year after the purchase.
Next year I bought another specimen (it is very hard to obtain here in Poland). The plant had inflorescences in buds. I planted it immediately into the florarium and this was a success. It didn't lose any leaf. Since then it was growing together with the "old" plant.
These inflorescences brought from the shop didn't open. The spathe broke and inside they were rotting.
3 months later the plant prepared to bloom again. It produces up to 4 inflorescences at one time.
In 2012 I took the plant out of the florarium, it grew at a standard room conditions, on a window sill. The first leaves looked differently, but after some time it returned to normal ones.
The inflorescences appear gradually, one after one in a few day periods and so they open.
photos in this page © Marek Argent

The IAS: Homalomena griffithii Tropicos: Homalomena griffithii CATE Araceae: Homalomena griffithii

page created on 2002-05-30
last updated on 2012-10-09