Brachystlema
Cameron McMaster (Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:16:57 PST)

Hi All,

Cameron sent me this message earlier on Brachystelma which I mentioned when
I was writing about his CD. I waited to forward it on to the group until I
found time to make a wiki page and add a few of the pictures from the CD of
this most interesting genus.
http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/index.php/…

Mary Sue

Dear Mary Sue

Your remarks regarding Brachystelmas in the your comments on my CD, Wild
Bulbs of the Eastern Cape (pbs digest, Vol 24, Issue 15), has prompted me
to react.

I included Brachystelmas in the CD because, although they are not strictly
bulbous plants, they are clearly geophytes with a thickened underground
stem (called a caudex). They are small plants, mostly pretty rare and
specialised in their habitats and always very difficult to find - so I find
them fascinating.

They are classified in the family Apocynaceae (Milkweed Family). According
to the latest update of Levyn's Guide to the Pant Genera of the Western
Cape by Terry Trinder Smith published by the Bolus Herbarium, University of
Cape Town (2003), they resort under the Tribe Ceropegieae in the Subfamily
Aschlepiadoideae. Better known genera within this tribe are the Stapelias
and Orbeas.

Elsa Pooley in her Field Guide to the Wild Flowers of Natal and the Eastern
Region (1998) describes the genus as follows:

Brachystelma (brachy - short; stelma - crown, refers to the often
extremely short corona) - Perennial herbs; stems usually annual. erect to
prostrate; roots fleshy, clustered or disc-like stem tuber; milky latex;
flower lobes fused, long or short, tubes usually shorter than lobes, corona
in 2 series; fruit spindlelike, erect. There are over 100 species occuring
in Africa, Asia and Australia. They are most diverse in South Africa where
approximately 70 species occur.

I hope this sheds a little light on a rather obscure genus.

Cameron McMaster
African Bulbs
PO Box 26, Napier 7270
Tel/Fax: 028 423 3651
E-mail: <mailto:africanbulbs@haznet.co.za>africanbulbs@haznet.co.za
Website: <http://www.africanbulbs.com/>http://www.africanbulbs.com/