Common Name: African Lily, Lily of the Nile
Description: Perennial herbs, rootstock tuberous; roots fleshy.
Leaves distichous, usually basal, strap-shaped, slightly fleshy or leathery, sessile.
Inflorescence an umbel on a tall, stout hollow scape with 2 deciduous spathe-like bracts; pedicels erect or spreading with basal thread-like bracteoles, articulating at the apex. Flowers actinomorphic, bisexual. Perianth segments petaloid, equal, connate towards base, tubular but slightly spreading to apex, dark blue to white. Stamens 6; anthers dorsifixed, introrse. Ovary superior, 3-locular; ovules numerous.
Fruit a capsule, with numerous flat, winged, black seeds.
Distribution and occurrence: Native to South Africa; 10 species; 1 species widely cultivated and occasionally naturalised in Australia.
Text by KL Wilson (Jan 2008) after PS Green (1994)
Taxon concept: PS Green (1994) in Flora of Australia vol. 49
| One species in NSW: Agapanthus praecox |
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