Plate 176.
Reading edition
SARCOPHYTE SANGUINEA. Cape Province. Balanophoraceae. Tribe Sarcophyteae. Sarcophyte, Sparrm.; Benth. et Hook. f. Gen. Plant. vol. iii. p. 234.
Sarcophyte sanguinea, Sparrm. in Vet. Acad. Handl. Stockh. 1776, 300, t. 7; Fl. Cap. vol. v. sect. ii. p. 213.
The family Balanophoraceae, to which our plant belongs, comprises plants all of which are parasitic on the roots of trees and shrubs. There are about fifty species, spread over about fifteen genera, widely distributed in tropical and sub-tropical regions. In South Africa the family is represented by two genera and four species.
Sarcophyte sanguinea is usually found as a parasite on the roots of Acacia Karroo, but so far as we know does not follow the same distribution as its host, but is confined to the eastern portion of the Cape Province. The plant really consists of a large inflorescence arising from the ground, and the two sexes are distinct. When in flower it has a most objectionable stench, so much so that the presence of a plant is known long before it is actually seen.
The accompanying plate illustrates a male plant.
Description:—Male plant about 30 cm. high. Root-stock thick, irregularly lobed, verrucose; stem short erect; leaves reduced to oblong obtuse or subacute scales up to 2 cm. long and 1·2 cm. wide. Inflorescence much-branched; flowers usually in pairs on short pedicels which are connate below. Perianth-segments navicular, almost patent, very thick and fleshy, subacute, 4 mm. long, 2·5 mm. wide; filaments 3 to nearly 4 mm. long, cylindrical; anthers terminal, scarcely wider than the filaments. Female plants very similar to the male, but rather shorter, flowers numerous in subglobose shortly stalked heads about 6 mm. in diameter. Ovary 1-3-celled; ovule solitary, pendulous; stigma discoid, sessile; fruit a syncarpium; seed about 1 mm. long (Flora Capensis).
Plate 176.—Fig. 1, scale-like leaf; Fig. 2, portion of male inflorescence; Fig. 3, single male flower, showing the three perianth-segments and the 3 stamens; Fig. 4, single stamen.
F.P.S.A., 1925.
