Montrichardia


Montrichardia is a genus of flowering plants in the family Araceae. It contains two species, Montrichardia arborescens and Montrichardia linifera, and one extinct species Montrichardia aquatica. The genus is helophytic and distributed in tropical America. The extinct species M. aquatica is known from fossils found in a Neotropical rainforest environment preserved in the Paleocene Cerrejón Formation of Colombia. Living Montrichardia species have a diploid chromosome number of 2n=48.

Species

M. linifera and M. arborescens can be differentiated by the appearance of their stem, leaves and spathe, with M. linifera having a stem described as "bamboo-like, smooth or tuberculate " and M. arborescens having a "moderately slender, prominently aculeate" stem, among other differences.