Plant Wiki

The open plant encyclopedia

Know any plant.
Grow it well.

Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.

  • 13,000+plants with full pages
  • 365,000+plant species worldwide
  • 220+countries covered

Common in

See all

The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.

What do you want to do?

Popular plants

Browse all plants

See them in 3D

All plants in 3D

Browse plants

Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.

Plant Wiki › Browse plants

Allium spathaceum

Allium spathaceum, the Ethiopian onion, is a bulb-forming perennial onion native to the Horn of Africa, growing up to about 40 cm tall with a few white flowers. Grow it like other dry-season onion relatives: a sunny spot with well-drained soil and little water while dormant.

Family
Amaryllidaceae (Daffodil & onion family)
Grows as
Bulb, Perennial
Light
Full sun
Water
Water moderately while growing and let the soil dry out fully once the foliage dies back.
Soil
Free-draining, sandy or loamy soil; avoid waterlogging.
Temperature
18–30 °C; protect below 5 °C
How easy
Moderate
Edible
Yes, some parts
Native range
E. Sudan to N. Somalia
Climate
subtropical

About

Allium spathaceum, the Ethiopian onion, is a plant species native to Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia and Sudan. Of the 900 known species of onion in the world, this is one of only a few that are endemic to the area.

Allium spathaceum is a bulb-forming perennial up to 40 cm tall, with a scent similar to that of onion or leeks. It has very narrow, linear leaves with hairs along the edges. The umbel contains only a few flowers, with long pedicels. Tepals are white with reddish midveins.

Other Allium plants

South Idaho onion · Abrams' allium · Allium aciphyllum · Tapertip onion · Allium aeginiense · Allium aflatunense · Allium agrigentinum · Allium alabasicum · Allium albotunicatum · Allium alibile · Altai Onion · Allium altissimum

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Allium spathaceum by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

Credits & terms

Identify a plant

Point at a leaf or flower and snap. One plant in frame works best.

Your photo
Starting camera…