Family Hyacinthaceae
Handsome, striking, unique, peculiar, these are the kind of words that are used to describe this unusual plant. Eucomis autumnalis is a deciduous, summer growing bulb. The bulbs are large (8-10cm diameter), ovoid in shape, and give rise to a rosette of large, broad, soft-textured, fleshy, wavy-edged leaves, about 12-35 cm long x 60-75 cm wide. The inflorescence is a dense cylindrical raceme on a stout stalk, crowded with up to ±125 starry yellowish-green flowers with a tuft of leaf-like bracts at the tip. The inflorescence pushes the overall height of the plant up to ±50-60 cm. Flowers are produced in mid to late summer (December to February). After pollination, whilst the seeds are developing inside the swelling ovaries, the flowers turn green and the inflorescence remains decorative into autumn. The fruit is a trilocular capsule containing shiny black rounded seeds.
The name Eucomis is derived from the Greek eukomos meaning beautifully haired, from the Greek eu- meaning well and kome hair of the head, and refers to the tuft of leaf-like bracts that crown the inflorescence. This same feature also gave it its English and Afrikaans common names. The specific name autumnalis refers to its flowering and fruiting time. It has acquired a number of synonyms over the years, where variants were defined as separate species but these are now regarded as part of the same species, or where the same plant has been given different names by different botanists.
Eucomis is a member of the Hyacinthaceae (hyacinth family), formerly part of the Liliaceae (lily family), a family of perennial bulbous herbs consisting of ±46 genera and ±900 species found in Africa, Eurasia and North America but most richly represented in southern Africa and in the Mediterranean region to south west Asia. Related species known to South African gardeners include Lachenalia mathewsii, Veltheimia bracteata and Scilla natalensis while species more familiar to northern hemisphere gardeners include the hyacinth, Hyacinthus orientalis and the bluebell, Hyacinthoides non-scripta. The genus Eucomis consists of approximately eleven species that occur in southern Africa, Zimbabwe and Malawi. There are approximately ten in southern Africa, that occur in all eight provinces of South Africa, and in Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland, where they are found widespread in grassland, forest, swamps and river banks but are absent from the drier areas.
