Encephalartos friderici-guilielmi stem

An imposing, stocky stem has been grown by the Encephalartos friderici-guilielmi plant in the photo. A wide girth has arrived with age; ample leaves at the stem top rise and spread in a stately presence.

The stem is covered in soft wool and cataphylls, yellowish brown in colour, especially nearer the top. This is interspersed with some persisting rings of removed leaf bases from long ago (Hugo, 2014; Coates Palgrave, 2002).