Description:
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Hairless perennial herb with annual stems up 35 cm high, growing from a fleshy cylindrical rootstock; rootstock, 20–30 cm long and 2-4 cm wide. Leaves sessile, lanceolate to obovate, up to c. 12 cm long; margin entire; stipules c. 1 mm long, deciduous. Flowers axillary and in terminal 3-branched umbels. Bracts to 4.5 × 4 cm, deltoid, up 4.5 cm long, subcordate at the base. Cyathia on peduncles to 1.5 mm long, 5.5 × 10 mm, with cup-shaped involucres; glands 5, spreading, transversely elliptic with outer margin obscurely crenulate; lobes 1.5 × 3 mm, rounded, margin entire and minutely ciliate. Male flowers many: bracteoles laciniate with feathery apices; stamens 8 mm long. Female flower with styles 2 mm long, widely spreading, with shortly bifid apices. Capsule deeply 3-lobed, c. 1.2 cm long and wide; pedicel 2.5 mm long. |
Literature:
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Carter, S. & Leach, L.C. (2001). Euphorbiaceae: subfamily Euphorbioideae: tribe Euphorbieae Flora Zambesiaca 9(5) Pages 380 - 382. (Includes a picture).
Mapaura, A. & Timberlake, J. (eds) (2004). A checklist of Zimbabwean vascular plants Southern African Botanical Diversity Network Report No. 33 Sabonet, Pretoria and Harare Page 41.
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