Tropicals & Tender Perennials: How to ID elephant ears!!!, 1 by bwilliams

bwilliams wrote:
OK now for Xanthosomas. This group can be a bit tricky even for botanist. Eduardo is a botanist in Brazil working on this group now and is the best at ID all species. Xanthosomas are new world tropical meaning it is from south america. It is closely related to syngonium this maybe why they always have white sap which syngoniums share the same trait. The leaves are usually very thin and the back lobes are NOT fused together. In the following picture you can see me holding a leaf. If you notice my finger is inbetween the back lobed area and the leaf is cut down to the stem. This is seen in all Xanthosomas. So what to look for in IDing a Xanthosoma the leaves are thin. The leaves do not point upward when mature but are horazontal to downward. The sap is white. The back lobes are not fused so if you look at the leaf head on you should be able to see the stem between the lobes.