Haemanthus

Deciduous or evergreen bulbous herbs. Bulb 45-100 mm in diameter with thick fleshy tunics, usually conspicuously 2-ranked, sometimes splitting to form clumps. Leaves 1-6, mostly 2, present after or during flowering, distichous, erect to prostrate, ligulate to elliptical, often barred with red or dark green, glabrous or pubescent, thick-textured. Inflorescence a many-flowered, compact or spreading head; scape fleshy, slender to stout, solid, up to 370 mm long, +/- compressed, glabrous or pubescent, sometimes spotted with red, reclining in fruit; spathe valves 4-13, spreading and membranous or erect, fleshy and brightly coloured. Flowers regular, funnel-shaped, spreading and lax or erect and dense, pink, red or white; pedicels shorter or slightly longer than perigone. Tepals connate into a short cylindric or campanulate tube; segments connivent or spreading, longer than perigone tube. Stamens erect or spreading, +/- equal, arising in perigone throat; filaments filiform, free at base, mostly longer than tepal segments or occasionally half as long; anthers dorsifixed, versatile. Ovary subglobose; ovules bitegmic, solitary or in a collateral pair in each locule. Style erect, filiform, as long as stamens; stigma minutely tricuspidate. Berry ovoid to globose, white, orange or pink when ripe, often translucent and aromatic. Seeds ovoid, fleshy, 5-10 mm in diameter, wine-red to green or opalescent; embryo green. x = 8, 9.