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On the cover. Rhytidocaulon arachnoideum, newly described in this issue, is unusual in many ways. Members of the genus Rhytidocaulon are strange and wonderful mimicry plants easily passed over as dead, so wrinkled and cryptically colored are their succulent stems. Nevertheless, local people often consume them as a fresh, vegetable snack! Being a member of the milkweed family, pollinators (likely tiny flies) are lured into a highly complex and efficient pollination ritual similar to what happens in orchids: an entire packet of pollen, called a pollinium, is surreptitiously latched onto a tiny hair of the pollinator's leg or body and then (hopefully) delivered to the next flower. Meanwhile the fly has been duped into searching for a place to lay its eggs-and gets nothing for its trouble. The flowers on this species are unique in having a delicate webbing that stretches from one petal (lobe) to the next-like a spider's web-lending the species its name. The function of the webbing is unclear, but once this plant is established in our collections it can be studied, and perhaps its purpose will be revealed. Photo by Tom McCoy.
