225 

 THE KALO IN HAWAII (II). 



By \'aughan MacCaughey and Joseph S. Emerson. 



3. THE FLOWER. 



The production of flowers and seeds is uncommon in the case 

 of the kalo plant. Like many other tropical plants, it has come 

 to rely upon asexual, rather than sexual, methods of propaga- 

 tion. The plant develops vegetative rather than reproductive tis- 

 sue. Plants that have a similar habit are banana, sugar cane, 

 sweet potato, breadfruit, and hau tree. It is probably tlesirable, 

 from the standpoint of the economics of the plant body, that flow- 

 ering and seedage be suppressed, in such plants as the kalo. The 

 part of commercial value is the corm, a vegetable pa':t, which 

 would suffer if material were drawn from it to nurture flowers 

 and seeds. 



When blossoming does occur in the cultivated kalo, the flowers 

 appear shortly after the huli have been planted, and frequently 

 before the leaves have appeared. In the wild kalo, flowering, if 

 it occurs at all, is deferred until very late in the life of the plant. 

 By huli is meant the large central bud that is cut from the top of 

 the corm, together with the adjacent leaf-petioles, and is used to 

 progagate the plant. This is the common type of huli; others are 

 discussed under Propagation. 



The flower arises, as do the leaves, from the center of the leaf 

 •cluster. It is yellowish or creamish in color, and resembles in 

 shape and structure the calla lily or the Monstera flower. The 

 central club-shaped order, or spadix, is enclosed by the pointed, 

 hoodlike cover or spatlie. The spadix bears the luany small 

 florets, staminate and pistillate. The extreme tip of the stadix is 

 sterile, and is usually closely confined by the strongly twisted 

 spathe. Fertile seeds rarely develop. The method of pollination 

 is not known. It is interesting to know that the flowers of 

 plants closely related to the kalo are pollinated by snails.* 



Interesting contrasts will be discovered if one makes careful 

 •observations of the flowers of some wind-pollinated plant, such 

 as sugar cane, bamboo, corn, sorghum, grass, coconut palm, and 

 some insect-pollinated flowers, such as those of nasturtium, hi- 

 biscus, liaji, leluia, and compare these with the kalo flower. 



* The only snail occurring in the kalo pateheg of Hawaii is a large 

 aquatic snail imported by the Chinese in recent years. 



