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Perennial herb 10–50 cm high, epiphytic or terrestrial; tuber depressed-ellipsoid, to 6 cm in diameter, red or orange inside; stem often red, sparsely branched, fleshy, glabrous or sparsely hairy. Stipules pink, asymmetrically ovate-oblong, 3–15 mm long, irregularly ciliate-dentate or fimbriate, acute to acuminate. Leaves green above, the margin and veins red, reddish beneath, ovate to lanceolate in outline, asymmetric, 2.5–20 cm long, 1.5–14.5 cm wide, one side 1.5–2 times wider than the other and with a basal lobe often 1/4 to 1/6 of the total lamina length, base cordate and very unequal, margin often shallowly lobed, always serrate, apex attenuate, sparsely to densely hairy; venation palmate-pinnate; bulbils sometimes present in leaf-axils; petiole red, 1–10 cm long, with or without a ring of hairs at the junction with the lamina. Flowers in axillary bisexual cymes with 1–2 dichasia; peduncle red, 2–6 cm long; bracts persistent and conspicuous, green or pink, obovate, 2.5–12 mm long, acute; pedicels 7–40 mm long. Male flowers: tepals 4, orange or rarely yellow, the outer suborbicular, ovate or elliptic, 7–18≈6–15 mm, the inner elliptic to spatulate, 6–15≈4.5–8(–11) mm; stamens 40–60, filaments 0.5–3 mm long; anthers oblong, 0.7–1.8 mm long. Female flowers: tepals 5, orange or yellow, the outer elliptic or ovate, 6–17 mm long, 5–11 mm wide, the innermost elliptic, to 14.5≈6.2 mm; ovary ellipsoid, 4.5–9≈2–5 mm, 3-locular, 3-winged; placentation axile, placentas undivided; styles three, caducous, divided about halfway, the branches twisted, with a continuous undulating stigmatic band. Fruit an ellipsoid or cylindrical capsule, 6–28 mm long, 3–7 mm in diameter excluding the wings; wings subequal, triangular, 6–14 mm wide, sometimes extending distally beyond the capsule; dehiscence along the junction with the wing. Fig. 3, p. 16.