Crinum

Crinum is a genus of deciduous and evergreen bulbous herbs, some of them winter growing. The Crinum name is derived from the Greek word krinon meaning lily. In flower the plants are from 7 cm to 160 cm tall.

The bulbs are from 2 cm to 22 cm in diameter, sometimes forming clumps. Their outer tunics are tough and leathery, cartilaginous and sometimes membranous. The roots are fleshy.

The four to many strap-shaped leaves are present during flowering. Some species have thickened leaf midribs and some leaves have wavy or glassy margins. The sheathing leaf bases sometimes form false stems, the leaf-tips often truncated or broken off.

The inflorescence comprises a single to 25 flowers in a cluster at the top of a flattened, fleshy, solid scape. There are two spathe valves at the top of the scape, enclosing the buds early on.

The trumpet-, funnel- or salver-shaped flowers are long-tubed on spreading pedicels, the tubes sometimes curved. Flower colour is white or pink, often with deep pink tepal keels. The tepals are broadly lance-shaped, often with recurving tips.

The six stamens have thread-like, free filaments. The inferior, ellipsoid ovary is three-locular containing about 12 ovules per locule. The style is slightly three-lobed.

Pollination is largely performed by nectar-feeding hawkmoths.

The nearly globose fruit capsule doesn’t dehisce. The fleshy seeds are globose, nearly so or irregularly shaped.

There are about 65 Crinum species worldwide in the tropics and subtropics, the most wide-spread genus of the Amaryllidaceae family. About 40 of them occur in Africa south of the Sahara and 20 in South Africa. Some species appear very similar and are difficult to identify.

The roasted bulbs of some species are used in traditional medicine, while the leaves, bulbs and roots of some species contain a substance that may contribute in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.

The plant in picture is Crinum macowanii (Duncan, et al, 2016; Leistner, (Ed.), 2000; Manning, 2009).