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Proboscidea altheifolia

Proboscidea altheifolia
Photo: Didier Descouens, CC BY-SA 4.0

Proboscidea althaeifolia is a desert perennial from the southwestern United States, grown from a thick tuberous root with showy yellow to apricot flowers. It needs full sun, sandy well-drained soil and very little water.

Family
Martyniaceae (Martyni family)
Grows as
Bulb, Perennial
Light
Full sun
Water
Water sparingly and let the soil dry out fully between waterings, since the tuber rots in wet soil.
Soil
Sandy, fast-draining desert soil or a gritty cactus-style mix.
Temperature
18–40 °C; protect below 5 °C
How easy
Easy

About

Proboscidea althaeifolia is a species of flowering plant in the family Martyniaceae known by the common names desert unicorn-plant and yellow-flowered devil's claw. It is native to the desert southwest of the United States, where it grows in sandy habitat and blooms during the hot summer. This is a perennial herb growing from a thick, tuberlike yellow root. The stem is decumbent, creeping along the ground. The shiny leaves have rounded, oval, or roughly triangular blades up to 7 centimeters long which are deeply lobed and wavy along the edges. The inflorescence is an array of many showy, fragrant, bell-shaped flowers with five lobes flaring several centimeters wide. The flower is yellow to orange or apricot with an intricate pattern of speckles and streaks, its lower lobe lined with a nectar guide.

Other Proboscidea plants

Ram's horn · Doubleclaw · Sanddune unicorn-plant · New Mexico unicorn-plant · Mule grab

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Proboscidea althaeifolia 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.

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