Plants 80-140 mm high. Corm ± conic, 9-12(-15) mm diam., usually with a few cormlets at base on short stolons 5-8 mm long; tunics cartilaginous, breaking up into coarse fibres, yellow when young, sometimes accumulating in a dense mass. Stem erect below, strongly flexed outward above sheath of uppermost leaf, sometimes almost horizontal above, simple or 1-or 2-branched. Leaves 4 to 6, forming a basal fan, falcate and often all arching to one side, 3-5 mm wide, main vein and margins lightly thickened, only uppermost inserted on stem above ground, sheathing below. Spike nearly horizontal, lightly flexuose, (5)7-to 12-flowered; bracts green to green-grey, 15-20 mm long, inner shorter. Flowers creamy white, lower 3 tepals with yellow spot near base bordered with red, unscented; perianth tube cylindric, 35-40 mm long; tepals when fully open spreading at right angles to tube and all held in same plane, upper 3 narrowly elliptic, 20-22 mm long, lower tepals nearly linear, laterals 8-10 x 1.5-2.0 mm, lower median ± 15 x 4 mm. Filaments ± 8 mm long, exserted ± 4 mm from tube; anthers ± 3 mm long, purplish; pollen yellow. Style ± erect, dividing opposite anther apices, branches ± 2 mm long. Capsules obovoid, 3-lobed-retuse above, 8-12 mm long, lightly warty. Seeds ± 4 x 3 mm, broadly but unevenly winged with seed body eccentric.
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Cormous geophyte, 80-140 mm tall, corm tunics more-or-less woody. Leaves linear to falcate, thicker in the midline, mostly 3-5 mm wide. Flowers 5-12 in a nearly horizontal spike, salver-shaped, creamy white, with red and yellow nectar guides, perianth tube elongate-cylindrical, 35-40 mm long, dorsal tepal largest, erect or recurving, 20-22 mm long. Late Aug.-early Oct.
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