Asparagus glaucus Kies

Erect shrubs up to 0.5 m high, glabrous. Rhizome with thick, terete roots. Stems erect. Branches ascending, bearing secondary branches transformed into compound spines, up to ±70 mm long, with numerous lateral spinules up to 10 mm long (occasionally reduced); branchlets short, unarmed, placed in the axils of the compound spines and bearing the cladodes. Cladodes filiform, 3-10 mm long, apiculate, glaucous, overlapping, giving the branchlets a cylindrical soft appearance; absent at anthesis. Flowers numerous, axillary, placed close together, single or paired along short deciduous branchlets; tepals ±4 mm, greenish; stalks articulated near the middle. Ovary with ±8 ovules in each locule; shortly stipitate. Fruit a nutlet, the one seed enclosed in the globose, shiny perianth, ±5 mm in diameter.