A gigantic, brand-new aroid from Ecuador entered the Missouri Botanical Garden’s permanent collection today, becoming the six-millionth (is that a word?) new plant specimen found and classified by MOBOT researchers.
Dr. Tom Croat is pictured here with the aroid, which he found in late 2007 and recently determined to be a new species.
Check out a photo of the giant plant (with a leaf as large as your body) after the jump.
As botanists go, Croat is something of a cowboy. In 41 years of scouring far-off landscapes, he's collected 100,000 new plants, making him the fourth most prolific plant collector in the history of botany, according to MOBOT.
Croat was a main character in a January 2005 RFT feature, "Flower Power."
