Deciduous geophyte, (100-)200-500 mm high. Rhizome short, vertical; roots several, slightly swollen and tapering, lanate, current season’s complement without lateral rootlets, whitish, 5-6 mm diam. at base, previous season’s complement developing feeder rootlets, brownish. Cataphylls ± 10 mm long, surrounding shoots as well as leaf and scape bases, papery, translucent greyish brown. Leaves (2-)4-12, lanceolate-falcate, 150-200(-500) x 5-10(-30) mm, plane, soft-textured and succulent, retrorsely scabridulous on margins, withered and twisted at tips at flowering time, glaucous or dull green. Inflorescence: peduncle erect, sometimes becoming deflexed with age and in fruit, 3-7 mm diam.at base, green or flushed reddish, glabrous or pubescent with soft, straggling hairs; raceme compound, lax, with one or two suberect branches, the lower sometimes with an additional accessory branch, usually several (up to 6) inflorescences per plant, many-flowered, 100-200(-600) mm long; bracts ovate-acuminate, 7-9 mm long, membranous, glabrous or pubescent along midrib, ciliate along margins in upper half; pedicels (10-)12-19 mm long, erect in bud but arcuate-spreading at anthesis, glabrous, sparsely retrorse-scabridulous, strigose, or pubescent with spreading hairs, becoming sinuate-or spreading-erect in fruit but not elongating further. Flowers rotate, white or flushed pink on reverse with greenish or greyish midribs, tepals each with greenish or bright yellow spot near base, opening ± 13:00 and withering± 18:00, sweetly scented; tepals fused below for 1 mm, glabrous or pubescent adaxially at base and on midrib, outer oblanceolate, 10-13 x 2.3-3.0 mm, inner obovate, 10-13 x 3-4 mm, somewhat clawed in lower 3 mm and papillate-ciliolate along margins of claw. Stamens sub-erect; filaments filiform, tapering below, white or flushed pinkish in lower half, retrorsely scabrid or scabridulous except in uppermost 0.5-1.0 mm, outer 7-8 mm long, inner 8-9 mm long; anthers yellow, ± 1.8 mm long at anthesis. Ovary ellipsoid, ± 2 mm long, glabrous, green or greyish, with 10-14 ovules per locule; style erect, filiform, white, 10-11 mm long. Capsule ellipsoid, 10-12 x 4-5 mm, glabrous. Seeds tetrahedral, ± 2 mm diam., sparsely verrucose, pale reddish brown.
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Rhizomatous perennial, up to 0.5 m tall, some roots thin, others swollen and tapering to tips. Leaves (2-)4-12, erect, strap-shaped, somewhat falcate, margin slightly scabrid. Flowers white, spotted at base, close set in several, few-branched racemes, young scape with conspicuous, concolorous bracts, sometimes roughly hairy, becoming decumbent in fruit. Capsules narrow, 10-12 mm long, held erect. July-Aug.(Sept.).
Rhizomatous perennial to 1 m, roots many, thickened. Leaves few, lanceolate and falcate, leathery. Flowers in a slender, sparsely branched raceme, imbricate, white, bracts hairy.
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