Addisonia 23 



(Plate 236) 



ANTHURIUM SCANDENS 

 Climbing Tail-flower 



Native of the West Indies and continental tropical America 

 Family Araceas Arum Family 



Dracontium scandens Aubl. PI. Guian. 2: 836. 1775. 

 Pothos violacea Sw. Prodr. 32. 1788. 

 Anthurium violaceum Schott. Melet. 22. 1832. 

 Anthurium scandens Engler, in Mart. Fl. Bras. 3 2 : 78. 1878. 



This epiphytic aroid inhabits the moist forests of Porto Rico, 

 Hispaniola, Jamaica, Antigua, Trinidad, Margarita, and continental 

 tropical America, and was originally described and figured by 

 Plumier about the end of the seventeenth century. 



The anthuriums are terrestrial or epiphytic perennials with 

 creeping or arborescent stems, and often large, entire, lobed, or 

 parted leaves, which are often showy and sometimes velvet-like. 

 The flowers are perfect and arranged on a cylindric spadix at the 

 base of which is a large, often leathery, bract-like spathe, sometimes 

 brilliant red, pink, white, or green. The berries are fleshy, variable 

 in shape and size, and either red, orange, purplish, or greenish. 



Over four hundred and eighty species of Anthurium have been 

 described, of which only a few are under cultivation; these in 

 conservatories. 



The plant which furnished the illustration was grown at the New 



York Botanical Garden; it was obtained from the botanic garden 



at Utrecht, Holland, by exchange in 1902. 



The climbing tail-flower has slender, often unbranched stems 

 usually a foot or more long by a quarter of an inch or less thick, 

 with conspicuous net-like fibrous sheaths surrounding the internodes. 

 The alternate leaves have petioles which vary from three quarters 

 to three and one half inches long, and are less than one eighth of 

 an inch thick and channeled on the upper side The lanceolate, 

 lanceolate-ovate, or oval leaf -blades are rather thin, with scattered 

 brown or black dots on both surfaces; they are two to nearly six 

 inches long, and from an inch to nearly three inches wide, acute or 

 acuminate at the apex, and acute or occasionally rounded at the 

 base; the midvein is often prominent on both sides. The axillary 

 peduncles are slender and usually much shorter than the leaves; 

 the oblong-lanceolate or lanceolate spathes are green and less than 

 one inch long; the cylindric spadix is few-flowered and often longer 

 than the spathe; the globose or subglobose fruits are white or violet. 



P. Wilson. 



