Ron was the first to find one of these local ginger plants, and I wrote about them here.I didn't realise at that time quite what a very strange plant this is.
If you look closely, you'll see a nascent bud to the left, a bud with about six yellow and red flowers open in the middle, and, to the right, what is presumably the next stage, a sort of mini-pineapple with the petals withered, and pink fruit developing.
Now, we haven't been watching these plants closely enough. (I've transplanted a few to my garden, where we can keep a eye on them).Suddenly, at the next stage, they produce fruit, about 3 metres up, on long stems.
What's going on? How, exactly, does that mini-pineapple transform itself into a ten-foot fruit-bearer?
The only answer is to camp out next to one of the mini-pineapples, and photograph it, every hour, through the night.
Ron - get your sleeping-mat ready!
Update: 24/8/08. I was completely wrong on all of this. The small pineapple does NOT suddenly transform into fruit 10 feet above it, Instead, it's a different, but related plant that happened to grow in the same place, called Alpinia haenki (or macassarensis), which is even more rare.
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