Plant Datasheet for Costus claviger (aff. claviger) 'Marco's Pride'

This plant was collected by Marco Jimenez from Zamora, Ecuador. He was fishing along the Rio Numbaime when he saw this beautiful flowering plant and collected it then planted it in his garden. It has some affinity to the species Costus claviger but the triangular bracts and open but somewhat tubular flowers make it unique, so I really do not know for sure what it is. I have called it 'Marco's Pride'.

It fits fairly well with the description by Maas in 1977 of a Costus aff. Claviger. It has short truncate ligules, red bracts with green appendages, but the bracts have a noticable dark green nectar callus. The bracteole is about 25 mm long and the calyx is about 17 mm long. The flowers are consistent with others I have placed in this C. aff. claviger group.

Cultivar Description: Costus claviger type inflorescence but with narrow, acutely triangular bract appendages and flower more closed and tubular in shape. Vegetative parts are mostly glabrous, ligules about 10 mm and truncate. Terminal flowering, bracts are red turning green toward the apex of the appendage, bracteole 10 mm and calyx about 8 mm long, flower overall is pinkish in color with reddish cast to corolla lobes and labellum.

During my February 2015 trip to southern Ecuador I went to the Mayo Chinchipe region. My first trip to Ecuador in 2007 I was lucky enough totally by chance to meet Marco Jimenez (the father) in Zamora. He showed me a plant he was growing in his garden, and later I identified it as part of the C. aff. Claviger group and registered it with the cultivar name 'Marco's Pride'. This trip I saw hundreds of the same (or similar) plant with the narrow triangular bract appendages and the broad claviger type flowers. What is curious to me is that in three days covering the Mayo Chinchipe area, besides C. zamoranus, this was the ONLY type of Costus that we saw. None of the more common species such as C. scaber were found in this region. My thumbnail page for C. 'Marco's Pride' as seen in the Mayo Chinchipe region can be found athttp://www.gingersrus.com/images/R3330

ACCESSION NOTES:
Accessions of C. aff. Claviger that are the 'Marco's Pride' types: R3075 from 2007 in Marco's garden, R3327 and R3329 from 2015 along Tapala Road, R3330 from Rio Numbala