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Porcupine potato

Kedrostis nana

Porcupine potato
Photo: SAplants, CC BY-SA 4.0

Kedrostis nana, the porcupine potato, is a South African gourd-family species with a tuber-like caudex and climbing or trailing stems. It is grown as a cactus-style succulent that needs bright light and very sparing watering.

Family
Cucurbitaceae (Gourd family)
Grows as
Succulent
Light
Full sun
Water
Water sparingly during the growing season and keep almost dry while dormant.
Soil
Fast-draining sandy or gritty mix.
Temperature
18–30 °C; protect below 10 °C
How easy
Moderate
Native range
Cape Prov.
Climate
subtropical

About

Kedrostis nana (or Ystervarkpatat) is a species of flowering plant in the family Cucurbitaceae, indigenous to scrub vegetation in the coastal areas of South Africa, from Saldanha in the west, along the coast as far east as KwaZulu-Natal.

Other Kedrostis plants

African Haap · Cape Haap

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Kedrostis nana 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.

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