A few days ago I put up a new page on Anthurium bonplandii. All the information was taken from the orginal botanical text. I'm looking for additional practical information and grower input. If you grow this species, please post what you can add. I'd also appreciate any good photos to add to the page since our specimen is quite small (not the one in the photos, that one is full grown). According to Joep Moonen in Fench Guiana, this species is quite rare in nature. http://www.exoticrainforest.com/Anthurium bonplandii pc.html I suspect some growers will want to buy this specimen since some have been posting requests asking where to buy one. Sorry, at this time I can't give any help on that question. When young it does strongly resemble Anthurium jenmanii with the exception Anthurium bonplandii subsp. guyanum is apparently the one with the reddish new leaves. The true Anthurium jenmanii does not produce these reddish leaves according to Dr. Croat.
Thanks to Bill's post under Anthurium jenmanii, it appears many of us now have the wrong plant tag on A. jenmanii. According to Dr. Croat, the actual species with the reddish new leaves is not A. jenmanii but instead is one of the subspecies of Anthurium bonplandii subsp. guyanum. I just checked with Dr. Croat's office and he is currently on vacation so I can't get a quote from him at this time. But as soon as he returns, I'll make sure I get a quote directly from him regarding this very interesting information! As a followup, The quote below was sent to me on 11/05/07. It was taken from a personal email to Denis Rotolante who is one of the owners, along with Bill (Big Bill), of Silver Krome Gardens in Homestead, FL. Silver Krome is almost certainly the largest grower of Anthurium and unusual aroid species in the United States. If you grow aroids, you're growing some of Denis' and Bill's plants. "There has not been anything published since I published my revision of Anthurium sect. Pachyneurium in the Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden 78(3): 539-855.1991. The attractive, coriacious bird's nest sometimes called "jenmanii" sometimes A. bonplandii guayanum, sometimes as A. guayanum had the young leave reddish on the lower surface when young. I treated this as Anthurium bonplandii ssp. guyanum but it might just as easily be considered a distinct species as was treated by George Bunting. It is just that there is so much variation in all of those taxa that I could not find clear separation in them. Certainly this plant did not have anything really in common with A. jenmannii, a species which has a spathe that soon withers and falls off. Dr Tom Croat, Missouri Botanical Garden" I still have a message awaiting an answer directly from Tom. But for any who would like to purport I somehow contrived or misquoted this, I am simply again quoting Dr. Croat. The journal Dr. Croat refers to is the same journal I referred to in a previous post. And Dr. Croat says the Anthurium with the purple/red leaf is not what everyone is calling it, i.e.: Anthurium jenmanii. Dr. Croat just explained it is actually Anthurium bonplandii subsp. guyanum.
As soon as I get the opportunity, I will get a pic of my A. bonplandii subsp. guyanum as I think mine is a very fine representative of this plant. The leaves are significantly narrower near the petiole and much wider at the middle, quickly diminishing in width to the tips, giving a shape similar to the hooded portion of a "king cobra" in attack position. The newly emerging leaves are a deep wine-red, like the color of a Merlot or Chianti, and as they expand and finally harden to maturity, they become completely green. LariAnn Aroidia Research