The open plant encyclopedia
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.
The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.
Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.
Wachendorfia
Also called Bloodroots, Butterflylilies
Wachendorfia is a genus of perennial herbs from South Africa's fynbos, grown for their red rootstocks and yellow flowers. Grow them in a sunny spot in moist, well-drained soil, and they suit bog gardens.
Wachendorfia is a genus of perennial herbaceous plants that is assigned to the bloodroot family. The plants have a perennial rootstock with red sap. From the rootstock emerge lance- or line-shaped, sometime sickle-shaped, pleated, simple leaves set in a fan, that are flattened to create a left and right surface rather than an upper and lower surface. The leaves die when the seeds are shed in three of the species, and are perennial in one species.
The rootstock also produces flowering stems annually that carry a panicle of zygomorphic, yellow or yellowish flowers in two distinct forms, one with the style and one stamen bent to the right and two stamens to the left, and the other vice versa. The fruit opens with three valves and each contains a single, hairy seed. All species only occur in the fynbos biome in the Cape Provinces of South Africa.
Slightly frost hardy, Wachendorfias thrive outdoors in warm, near frost-free environments as an ornamental plant. Most require moist, well drained soils in a sunny position. Some are ideal for bog gardens. Propagation is via seed or division.
The flowers of the species of Wachendorfia are enantiomorphic. The style is sometimes sharply deflected to the right, while in other plants it is bent to the left. In both morphs one of the three stamens is deflected to the same side as the style, whereas the remaining two curve in the opposite direction. This is thought to be a mechanism that enhances crosspollination and so boosts genetic diversity. Flowers of the species of Dilatris are also chirally dimorph, but here both left- and right-handed flowers are found on the same plants.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Wachendorfia 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.
