Aloes and Lilies of Ethiopia and Eritrea

112 ASPHODELACEAE
Key to genera
The genus Asphodelus is included in the key, but not in the text, as its occurrence
within the area is doubtful, although it has been reported from Eritrea.
1. Tepals fused for most of their length, thus forming tubular to funnel-shaped
flowers 1. Kniphofia.
- Tepals free to the base, forming more or less star-shaped flowers 2
2. Tepals pinkish or yellow; filaments with long hairs 3
- Tepals white often with a reddish streak outside on the tepals; filaments
glabrous or scabrid, never hairy 4
3. Tepals yellow, all 1-nerved 2. Bulbine
- Tepals pinkish, the outer 3–5-nerved 3. Jodrellia
4. Pedicel without a joint, filaments scabrid without expanded base
4. Trachyandra
- Pedicels with a joint, filaments completely glabrous with expanded bases
clasping the ovary Asphodelus
1. KNIPHOFIA Moench
Plants growing from a thick rhizome in aggregates or
solitarily, rarely with a thick, well developed woody
stem. The leaves are arranged in basal rosettes, usually
in 4 or 5 ranks, linear, tapering gradually to the apex. The
scape is stout, naked except for occasional sterile bracts
below the inflorescence. The inflorescence is simple,
often subcapitate. The flowers are sessile or with a short
pedicel. The flowers are usually pendulous, with varied
colours: white, yellow, brownish or various shades of red,
the red pigment is often more conspicuous at the apex,
thus giving a bicoloured appearance. The perianth tube
is bell­shaped to cylindrical, or somewhat funnel­shaped.
The stamens are 6, usually as long as, or longer than,
the perianth at anthesis. The fruit is a globose to ovoid
loculicidal capsule. The seeds are somewhat flattened,
acutely three­ angled or ­winged.
The genus includes about 70 species distributed
essentially in eastern and southen Africa (with 45 species),
with one species in Madagascar and one in Arabia, and 7
species are known to occur in Ethiopia.