Fan Aloe
| Kumara plicatilis | |
|---|---|
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| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Monocots |
| Order: | Asparagales |
| Family: | Asphodelaceae |
| Subfamily: | Asphodeloideae |
| Tribe: | Aloeae |
| Genus: | Kumara |
| Species: | K. plicatilis |
| Binomial name | |
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Kumara plicatilis (L.) G.D.Rowley | |
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Kumara plicatilis, formerly Aloe plicatilis, the fan-aloe, is a succulent plant endemic to a few mountains in the Fynbos ecoregion, of the Western Cape in South Africa. The plant has an unusual and striking fan-like arrangement of its leaves. It may grow as a large multistemmed shrub or as a small tree. It is one of the two species in the genus Kumara.
Kumara plicatilis derives its common name fan-aloe from its former placement in the genus Aloe and the unusual distichous arrangement of its linear leaves. Its scientific name plicatilis also means "folded" or "pleated", or possibly "foldable"; it is in any case a misnomer because the leaves are nothing like plicate and do not fold. In the local Afrikaans language, Kumara plicatilis is commonly known as the waaier aalwyn (= 'fan aloe'). It also is called the kaapse kokerboom (= 'Cape quivertree') because of its resemblance to Aloidendron dichotomum. The resemblance lies mainly in its dichotomous branching habit, as it usually grows stems too short to be of much use for making quivers.
Kumara plicatilis can grow to a height of 3–5 metres (10–16 ft) tall. The trunk has corky, fire-resistant bark and the branches fork into pairs without a central leader, a pattern known as "dichotomous" branching. The branches bear masses of succulent, oblong, tongue-shaped leaves arranged in 2 opposite rows in the shape of a fan. To the imaginative, the leaf-heads look a bit like a mass of grey hands, raised in the air.
The leaves are grey-green in colour, about 300 mm long and 40 mm wide, and have tiny teeth along the margins that are noticeable only on close inspection. Kumara plicatilis shares the unusual distichous arrangement of its leaves with its tiny stemless sister-species Kumara haemanthifolia, which occupies the same small mountainous corner of the Western Cape in South Africa.
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Wikipedia