Aloes and Lilies of Ethiopia and Eritrea

Fig. 122.
Dracaena
fragrans, from
between Godere
and Bebeka,
Illubabor floristic
region.
Description
4. Dracaena ombet Kotschy & Peyritsch
DRACAENA 279
The specific epithet ‘ombet’ is a vernacular name of
the species in the Bedani language of the Sudan. It was
described by Kotschy and Pey ritsch in 1867.
It differs from the rest of the species in the genus by
having succulent leaves, about 1 cm thick.
Tree (2–) 4–8 m tall, single trunk up to 40 cm in diameter, eventually
branching into an umbrella­shaped crown, bark pale brown showing
a dense annular pattern of leaf scars. Leaves congested at the ends of
branches, gray to blue­green, up to 90 × 3 cm, very tough and thick,
strongly red-brown tinged, upper surface flat to somewhat con cave,
lower surface convex to obscurely keeled; margins cartilaginous.
Inflorescence an erect panicle to about 50 cm long, lower branches
paniculate, upper ones racemose, glabrous, subtended by a series of
bracts; pedicels paired to clustered, about 2 mm long and articulate