Commelina zambesica C.B.Clarke

Straggling, robust, pale green annual herbs. Leaves narrowly elliptic, attenuate above and below, c. 100 x 25 mm, scabrid, especially so along margins, sparsely hairy (hairs multicellular), sheath up to 20 mm long, auriculate at the apex, ciliate. Spathe on a firm erect peduncle c. 10 mm long, funnel-form, broadly ovate, apex abruptly acute, hispid. Upper cyme well-developed or reduced to a short stalk; lower cyme c. 3-flowered. Flowers with petals, stamens and staminodes ink-blue; ovary smooth, green, 3-celled, 5-ovuled. Capsule asymmetrically obovoid, obtuse; dorsal locule with 1 large seed; 2 ventral locules with smaller seeds; seeds globose to oblong-globose, brown with some irregular, raised, white ridges converging towards embryotega and minutely papillate.

A tropical plant. It grows in woodland and grassland in northern Nigeria. In Ethiopia it grows between 580-1,480 m above sea level.

The leaves are cooked as a vegetable.