Hessea pulcherrima (D.Müll.-doblies & U.Müll.-doblies) Snijman

Bulb usually solitary, deep-seated, depressed-globose, 10-20 mm diam., with outer tunics lightly fibrous and tawny-brown; neck slender, up to 85 mm long. Leaves absent at anthesis, 2, suberect to spreading, narrowly lorate, up to 150 x 1-2 mm, more or less spirally twisted towards the apex, glabrous, with adaxial surface shallowly grooved, sheathed by a subterranean cataphyll. Inflorescence widely spreading, 30-90 mm across; scape stiff and wiry, 35-90 mm long, 0.5 mm diam., wine-red basally, light greyish brown above, breaking off at the base in fruit; spathe valves linear-lanceolate, 15-30 x 0.2-2.0 mm; bracteoles up to 3 mm long. Flowers 4-20, spreading, stellate, white, marked with crimson centrally as well as on the tips of the outer tepals, rarely unmarked, turning light brown with age, faintly scented; pedicels wiry, upwardly curved, 20-50 mm long, deep wine-red, occasionally green. Tepals free to the base, outspread or deflexed, sometimes slightly obliquely twisted, oblanceolate, 4.5-6.0 x 1.0-2.5 mm, the adaxial surface covered with minute papillae proximally. Stamens equalling the tepals or shorter than the tepals, suberect proximally and outspread distally; filaments varying from shortly connate to free at the base, dark crimson or white; the proximal half broadened laterally, with the ventral surface densely covered with papillae and bearing a 1 mm long inwardly-curved blunt or irregularly raised hook 1.0-1.5 mm from the base which overarches the disc; the distal half subulate; anthers subcentrifixed, 1-2 mm long before opening, red to dark crimson; pollen pale yellow to cream-coloured. Ovary with up to 3 ovules per locule, with the dome elevated into 3 green, trichome-covered pulvini between the style and inner filament whorl. Style up to 6 mm long, somewhat trigonous proximally but slender throughout, dark crimson or white, with nectar collecting in a pool around the base and spreading up the filament bases where it is held by the trichomes on the ventral surface. Seeds 2-4 mm diam.