Alocasia amabilis W. Bull; A. cochinchinensis Pierre ex Engler & K. Krause; A. cuspidata Engler; A. lowii Hooker var. veitchii (Lindley) Engler; A. veitchii (Lindley) Schott; Caladium veitchii Lindley.

Herbs, terrestrial, small to robust, to 150 cm tall, evergreen or seasonally dormant. Stem rhizomatous, elongate, erect to decumbent, sometimes subtuberous, 8-60 × 2-8 cm. Leaves 1-3 together, subtended by lanceolate papery-membranous cataphylls; petiole terete, 30-120 cm, glabrous, sheathing in proximal 1/4, purple-brown to green, strikingly obliquely mottled chocolate-brown; leaf blade pendent, green or flushed with purple abaxially, dark green often with major venation gray-green adaxially, narrowly hastate-sagittate, 27-85 × 14-40 cm; posterior lobes peltate for (5-)10-30% of their length, acute, anterior lobe with 4-8 primary lateral veins on each side, axillary glands conspicuous, interprimary collective veins weak. Inflorescences solitary or paired; peduncle 8-18 cm, resembling petioles, subtended by cataphylls. Spathe 7-17 cm, abruptly constricted 1.5-3.5 cm from base; proximal spathe green, ovoid; limb erect, later reflexing, pale green, lanceolate, canoe-shaped, 5.5-7.5 cm. Spadix somewhat shorter than spathe, 6-13 cm, stipitate, stipe whitish, conic, ca. 5 mm; female zone 1-1.5 cm; pistil green, subglobose, 1.5-2 mm in diam.; stigma white, subsessile or on a slender style to ca. 0.5 mm, 3- or 4-lobed; sterile zone 7-10 mm, narrower than fertile zones; synandrodes mostly rhombic-hexagonal, flat-topped; male zone ivory, subcylindric, tapered at base, 1.2-2.5 cm × 4.5-8 mm; synandria 4-6-merous, ± hexagonal, ca. 2 mm in diam.; appendix pale orange, 3.5-9 cm, subcylindric, tapering to a point. Fruiting spathe glossy green, ovoid, 4-7 cm. Fruit ripening orange-red, globose-ellipsoid, ca. 1.5 × 0.75 cm. Fr. Aug-Oct.

Tropical forests, thickets; 100-1000 m. Guangdong, Hainan, S Yunnan [Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, S Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam].