Lobelia plumieriL. [family CAMPANULACEAE], (1753). Fig. 313. [type as above]
Information
Evergreen shrub, up to c. 1 m tall; stems fleshy, with prominent leaf-scars, glabrous. Leaves alternate, clustered at tips of branches, fleshy, 5–11.5 x 2–7.5 cm, obovate and tapering towards the base, glabrous except sometimes for tuft of hairs in leaf-axils. Flowers sessile, in bracteate axillary cymes. Calyx forming a c. 2 mm high rim. Corolla white, greenish or yellowish; tube 9–13 mm long, shortly pubescent outside, densely hairy inside; lobes up to 11 mm long, greenish, with white, membranous, crenulate margins. Ovary with only 1 ovule developing. Drupe black or bluish, ellipsoid to globose, 10–15 mm wide, fleshy, wrinkled when dried.
Range
N3; C1; S2, 3 coast of eastern Africa southwards to the Cape Province, also in western tropical Africa, Madagascar, the Mascarene Islands, Sri Lanka, and tropical America.
