Description :

• Acaulescent, coarse, evergreen, very drought-hardy perennials, strongly rhizomatous, forming colonies; rhizome cylindrical, thick, fibrous, articulated, bearing clasping, thin, early deciduous cataphylls; roots placed below or near aerial shoots
• Leaves sessile, rosulate or distichous, one to few, flat or cylindrical or semicylindrical with a groove on adaxial side, plain or with irregular, transverse, darker and lighter green bands; juvenile leaves may differ in shape from mature ones
• Inflorescence a spike-like raceme
• Flowers numerous, subsessile, in irregular clusters along scape, opening haphazardly above and below, opening towards evening and for one night only, delicately scented
• Stamens erect, much exserted, fused to tube below; filaments filiform
• Ovary ovoid; style long and filiform, at anthesis exserted early from closed perianth
• Fruit a berry, smooth or tuberculate, Seeds 1-3, bony, covered with a thick, softly verrucose epidermis
• x = 10 (6, 7) (aneuploids, high polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

• Sansevieria Thunb.
  • Thunberg: 65 (1794)
  • Obermeyer: 5 (1992)
  • Van Jaarsveld: 11 (1994)
  • Chahinian: 7 (1996)

Distribution & Notes:

• Global : Species ± 60, mostly tropical Africa and Asia
• Southern Africa : Species at least 6, widespread, except Lesotho and Western Cape